But with their go-to man in the coaches box, the Swans were much less predictable with the way they went about it. Maybe it was the occasion that lifted them, but they seemed hungrier too.

"We were having a real crack," coach John Longmire said. "They're an absolute gun team ... so we had to be absolutely foot to the floor and I thought there were parts of the game we were. Just that ability to sustain it for that four quarters is what we've been trying to get hold of.

"You look at the scoreboard and it reflects a reasonable loss but there's some stuff that came out of the game that I was pleased with."

Inspired by what looked like a ferocious pre-game pep talk from a finger-pointing Dane Rampe, the Swans made a hot start, kicking the first goal through Jordan Dawson, attacking the contest hard and generally throwing their weight around. Isaac Heeney's piledriver tackle on an unsuspecting Aidan Corr set the tone.

But all their intent amounted to very little as the Giants shrugged off the challenge and took control. Two minutes after slotting the opener, Dawson had a defensive kick intercepted by Lachie Whitfield, who went back and kicked an easy goal from directly in front. Three more quickly followed and all of a sudden, they were up by 22 points.

The Swans responded with back-to-back goals but the quarter-time stats sheet was telling. Between them, Coniglio and Josh Kelly had 21 disposals, four clearances and kicked 2.2 in the first term. The inside 50 count was 20-8 to the Giants.

The warning signs were there – and Sydney heeded them, catapulting themselves into the lead with the first three goals of the second quarter through Nick Blakey, Heeney and Sam Reid, who stood up brilliantly in Franklin's absence.

The game was evenly poised but two lucky moments put GWS back in front. First, Cameron generated a shot for Toby Greene out of nowhere by soccering a loose ball into Jackson Thurlow's boot, which then went out on the full. From the tightest possible angle, 40m out, Greene slotted it.

Then, Josh Kennedy soccered a loose ball into Lloyd's shin which then ricocheted over the line for a goal. The Swans got one back through a sensational Luke Parker snap before half-time, bringing the margin back to just five points.

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The arm-wrestle continued in the third term, but the Giants started to get on top – with a little help from the officials, it must be said. The unhelpful camera angles of the score review system saw Lloyd's third goal given when it looked to the naked eye like Reid had got a hand to it just in time – then a somewhat dubious free kick in the goal square to Coniglio led to another GWS gimme. Whitfield, who had a very quiet night by his standards as he nursed a corked left leg, kicked their third in a row and it was out to a game-high 23 points.

From there, the Giants ran away with the game, booting five goals to two in a one-sided final stanza. It was hard to spot much orange in the 29,780-strong crowd at the SCG – the lowest for a derby at this venue since 2014 – but those who made the trek from the west would have gone home quite content.

GWS coach Leon Cameron felt that way, considering the way his side's midfield succumbed to Fremantle the week before. "Coniglio, Taranto and (Jacob) Hopper, they'd be the first one to put their hand up last week," he said. "Sometimes you've just got to acknowledge when you get beaten and we got beaten fair and square. But I thought they bounced back ... they're really hard to win, derby games. We knew they'd throw everything at us."