Last but by no means least for our final review of the team’s event for Woodpecker XXV is the ageless Swans. Lead by the triage of transcendence Barry Traill, Yawn Morsely, and Mick Fight the Swans started off with a hiss and a roar with 5 individual champions in the first 7 years and have been paying the price for it ever since through handicapping skullduggery.
The last time the Swans won any trophy was 13 years ago playing on their local course in Wanaka, when they held off the fast-finishing Horks to win the Fraser Moors Memorial Kauri. They thought that they had taken the double with Mick Flight prematurely celebrating the win with champagne on the 18th tee (only to chobble his ball down the fairway as a direct result of the bubbles – a known side-effect of champagne and golf is bubble-chobble).
“We’re doing it for Danny and the Bay!”
In 2023, the Swans are again going to be doing it tough with the late withdrawal of their brightest hope and the second-greatest player never to win a Woodpecker, Danny Smurfette who has had to withdraw to help the recovery efforts back in Hawkes Bay (for which there are no words that can describe the devastation caused by the cyclone).
Naturally, the Swans have banded together and are going to “do it for Danny and the Bay” which has put immense pressure on Mick Fight – the greatest player never to win a Woodpecker and the returning Loveanich, back in the fold after a year in the Fantails for disciplinary reasons.
Had star Magpie Mark Gemstone not reneged on his transfer to the Swans back in 2022 and had the hare not stopped at BK for a whopper with cheese and a dump, the Swans would have a lot more to smile about.