Swans vs Geelong at the SCG today.The Swans' Neil Brunton and Mark Bayes, top arrive too late on the scene to prevent Geelong's Michael Mansfield from marking yesterday.The fallacy that the Sydney sporting public will only support winners was in many ways

Swans vs Geelong at the SCG today.The Swans' Neil Brunton and Mark Bayes, top arrive too late on the scene to prevent Geelong's Michael Mansfield from marking yesterday.The fallacy that the Sydney sporting public will only support winners was in many ways exploded at the SCG yesterday.The Swans succumbed to their 23rd consecutive loss, a 25-point defeat by Geelong 19.15 (129) to 15.14 (104).But to the players' amazement they received a standing ovation as they left the field, perhaps not winners on the scoreboard, but certainly winners with their fans.The crowd of 9,594 was not rejoicing in the fact that the Swans had restricted Geelong from inflicting a massacre of similar proportions to that which Brisbane had done just seven days earlier, nor was it that the result was the Swans' best and narrowest loss of the season.The applause was for the spirit and fight that the locals had displayed - certainly their most intense performance since the losing sequence began on May 17, last year. May 24, 1993. (Photo by Tim Clayton/Fairfax Media via Getty Images).