IN what has been a frustrating AFL Women’s season for Fremantle coaches, players and fans alike due to no real fault of their own, head coach Trent Cooper declared his pride for his team after it overcame odds to defeat Sydney on the road. While the Swans might be on the bottom of the Season 7 ladder without a win, the Dockers were down to their injury replacement players and the injury list up to double-digits. Fremantle found a way to win though, defeating Sydney 6.6 (42) to 4.4 (28) at Henson Park.

Cooper said Season 7 had been a rollercoaster from a disappointing Round 2 loss against Geelong at home, to spirited efforts against Adelaide and Melbourne. Though the loss against Collingwood in Round 8 was a disappointing performance, he was “incredibly proud” that his chargers could bounce back.

“Last week was definitely a step back, so to rebound, the girls rocked up to training during the week with a really positive attitude,” Cooper said. “To get the win gives them some validation of the work they’ve been doing.”

The biggest inclusion of the week – and perhaps the season – was that of Ebony Antonio, with the star winger/forward slotting a brilliant goal from the boundary early in the match. Cooper heaped praise onto the experienced talent, saying she provided the group with plenty of confidence.

“She’s not a high possession player, but she’s a high impact player,” Cooper said. “Whenever Ebony’s on the field you’ve got a chance of winning a game because she can just do things that not many in the comp can do. That just gives the group confidence.

“She’s a big personality around the group as well so when we showed her highlights video at training on Thursday night, we were like ‘wow’ we’d forgotten what we’d missed, and then early on today you could see some of that out there.”

Cooper admitted the plan was to get Antonio in for the final two games of the season so she could head into preseason confident of her knee – she had done her posterior cruciate ligament (PCL) – and with some match fitness in the bank for Season 7.

“I think that was the real benefit,” Cooper said. “It’s not going to change our season, but for her to have that ticked off, she’s worked really hard through that rehab process so now she can have a bit of a break as well.

“It’s mentally pretty difficult in that rehab. Sometimes rehab’s a lonely place, but it hasn’t been for our group this year, we’ve had a few together. But that group have been fantastic all year and really inspired the rest and Ebony’s been a big driver in that.”

While the result will not change the Dockers’ season – it was just the second win of Season 7 for Fremantle – getting the four points was less about securing the points as it was, relieving the players of pressure and giving them confidence going forward.

“We think we’ve been improving in the back half of the year, but just to get that validation for the group that we’re on track and wins do that,” Cooper said. “They’re not as important as they should be, but that’s why we play sport, to get that feeling. To do that today the group we didn’t play well at all in the last eight minutes but inside the players don’t really care about that because they’ve got that winning feeling.”

Cooper said he felt the team performed better into the breeze than with it, particularly in the third term, where they did not need to drop a player behind the ball. Level or leading at each break, the Dockers kicked the only goal of the final term to secure the win.

“I thought the third quarter, our ball movement into the breeze was really, really good,” Cooper said. “Last quarter we started off alright then probably got bogged down a little bit and didn’t score as well as we would have liked with the breeze, but into the breeze we did quite well. We were happy with aspects of the ball movements and there’s still things to work on because we want to be challenging the better teams so we need to do a bit more on that.”

The Fremantle coach also praised the Swans for their effort and how far they had come in Season 7, with the competitive nature of the wooden spooners always going to be better for the competition. Next week Fremantle plays another expansion side in Hawthorn, returning home on Saturday October 29 to close out the Dockers’ season at Fremantle Oval. Incredibly, a win could see the Dockers leapfrog as many as five teams with a victory into 10th, and likely 11th if the favourites get up.