‘Pay the price’ for grand final glory: Matthews

Legendary Brisbane coach Leigh Matthews says Lachie Neale will be comfortable “paying the price” of fighting through a painful heel injury for one more game against Sydney.

The dual Brownlow medallist has struggled to train a large part of the season and was unlikely to complete much work during the Lions’ main training session at Punt Road on Thursday after the injury was aggravated in the semi-final win over GWS a fortnight ago.

Matthews, who guided the Lions to a three-peat of premierships as coach, said Neale would be aware of the pain to come “in the aftermath” but would find it easier getting himself to the line on the grand final stage than he had in previous weeks.

“Everyone’s got to pay the price – Chris Scott used that term last week, paying the price of admission to be putting yourself out on the line out there,” Matthews said.

“The players are obviously putting themselves out on the line physically … it’s quite easy probably when it comes to the grand final, if it’s been done for a lot of weeks up to the grand final.

“Mind over matter a bit in grand finals, I reckon … players have played with things in grand finals that they probably couldn’t cope with, or want to cope with, in any game other than the last game of the year.”

The coach of the Lions’ three-peat side praised Chris Fagan for his efforts turning around their 2-5 start to the season but said accolades coming his way, including the Allan Jeans Senior Coach of the Year award, were also thanks to the wider football department.

“(Fagan) has done a great job individually, but as he says all the time, there are 20 to 30 people in the footy department close to the team who are all part of that process,” Matthews said.

“The fact they started the season slowly, but then they won nine games straight to get themselves up towards the top of the ladder.

“Any team that can string nine games together will usually end up around the action.”

Matthews said it was “hard to tell” which side was better placed for success on Saturday, with the Lions riding the high of three consecutive finals wins but the Swans well rested after only two games in a four-week period.

“In terms of what’s the best preparation going into the game, you’d like to be physically fresh, you’d like to have really hard, close games over the last month,” he said.

“I think the Lions are in good shape, they’ve had close games obviously … it’s more how you come up this week, and it’s always hard to tell whether having the rest after the qualifying final helps or hinders.

“I think it helps once you get through the preliminary final because you might be just a little bit better in the grand final, but all that is just speculation.”