Brisbane coach Chris Fagan has branded Joe Daniher a “big game” player and was confident the star Lion would deliver when it mattered most in the Lions thrilling five point semi-final win over the Giants on Saturday night in Sydney.
The veteran coach said Brisbane’s thrilling comeback from 44-points down to defeat the Giants in the sudden-death semi-final is “one that I will never forget” and said the atmosphere in the Lions’ rooms afterwards was supercharged.
“You don’t very often have days like that in footy and that will be one that I will never forget,” he said.
“It was just one of the great comeback wins. I am very proud of the group. We stuck to our guns and when everything looked lost, we hung in there, which has been the team all year. The character of the team was on display tonight and it sort of summed up our season.”
Having trailed for almost the entirety of the night, Daniher was able to wrest the lead back for Brisbane with two superb set shots in the dying stages.
He kicked his third goal for the night from outside the boundary line after the Giants were penalised for deliberately knocking the ball out of bounds and then the match-winner from a similarly testing angle after out-marking brilliant defender Sam Taylor.
“(I’m) very happy but I am not surprised that he kicked them. He lives for those big moments,” Fagan said.
“He will do some things and you will scratch your head and go, ‘What is he doing?’. But under pressure tonight, and it doesn’t get any bigger than that, he kicked them straight through the middle.
“I was fairly confident, because he usually goes well from that side … even if it doesn’t seem right. He has been a great finals performer for us. You think about what he did in last year’s finals series? He kicked more goals than any other player. He is a big game player.”
The Giants led by 44 points at the 18min mark of the third term and had overrun the Lions in their two previous meetings this year.
But in a season where Brisbane has been under pressure after a slow start, Fagan said he never lost faith, reiterating to his players at half-time the “dancing on thin ice” theme that has been a factor in the Lions resurgence in the second half of the season.
