GEELONG made it two wins from two games to start its AFL Women’s campaign yesterday with a 27-point win over the Sydney Swans.

In many ways, Geelong’s success in yesterday’s clash can be pinned on its fast start in the first quarter. The Cats kicked five goals straight to Sydney’s four behinds, to really set the tone for the match.

Taking a deeper dive into the stats, and one glaring stat for the Swans and what might have cost them the game is their inside 50 efficiency. Although it rose as the game progressed – jumping from 36.4 per cent at quarter time to 44.7 cent at full-time – the fact it was significantly lower than Geelong’s, particularly in the first term, which played a big part in the Swans falling as behind as they did.

The fact they fell so far behind so early meant they had to play catch up for the rest of the game, which is rarely successful, much less for newer teams like the Swans.

What makes the inside 50 efficiency stat even more telling is taking a look at the inside 50 count. At quarter time it was 11 apiece, and at half-time it was 21 to 18 in favour of the Swans.

Sydney did see an uptake in scoring in the second quarter and even outscored the Cats in that term, but the first quarter is where the stark picture was really told.

The Swans were level with the Cats in terms of how many times it went inside their attacking 50, but could only muster four behinds for their efforts. Chloe Molloy, Rebecca Privitelli, Aliesha Newman and others just could not find the middle of the big sticks, and it really cost them.

Meanwhile up the other end, Nina Morrison, Amy McDonald and Georgie Prespakis were lining up Jacqueline Parry, Chloe Scheer and others for plenty of chances on goal, and the forwards were rewarding feeds by turning them into goals. Scheer had four goals to half time and Parry had two.

The other thing to note is how well the Cats’ forwards were making the most of their opportunities. For example Scheer only had eight disposals in the first half, and five of them were kicks. Considering she had four goals at that point, that is almost a goal for every kick she recorded.

Parry was a similar story. She only had the six touches to her name at half-time, but already had two goals to her name.

If you compare Sydney’s inside 50 efficiency this week to last week’s, you notice a significant drop off. It finished last week’s match with an inside 50 efficiency of 65.6 per cent, which is significantly better than what it was at any point yesterday.