AAA<\/p>\n
Sydney Swans AFLW captain Lucy McEvoy says the club has \u201ctaken a reputational hit\u201d after five male players were stood down for breaching club standards and a police investigation into an alleged sexual assault continues.<\/p>\n
However, McEvoy said the actions of those players \u2013 James Jordon, Chad Warner, Isaac Heeney, Riley Bice and Nick Blakey \u2013 were not a reflection of the broader club, and called on fans to support the team at Sunday\u2019s double-header at the SCG, which will be the second time the women\u2019s team have played a competitive match at the historic venue.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn behalf of the playing group, we also support the club in the sanctions that were handed down to the players,\u201d McEvoy said on Friday.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are incredibly disappointed, as a lot of people are, with what\u2019s occurred at the beginning of this week, and we know that the actions of those five players are not a reflection of the broader club and the programs more broadly.\u201d<\/p>\n
The men\u2019s captain Callum Mills spoke to the women\u2019s team earlier in the week, but McEvoy confirmed that none of the five suspended players had been in contact with the AFLW team.<\/p>\n
McEvoy denied there was any rift between the AFL and AFLW programs, saying the club was \u201cabsolutely united\u201d. The two programs united this week and even shared a barbecue at the club\u2019s headquarters.<\/p>\n
McEvoy said the women\u2019s team had not discussed how they would feel about any of the five players returning to the club in the future, but when asked if it was something she would like input in, she said, \u201cabsolutely, yes\u201d.<\/p>\n
![\"Swans](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/c6325cca6b04ca623a6e9671e876162f51a4ef45.jpeg\")
Swans AFLW captain Lucy McEvoy and coach Colin O\u2019Riordan front the media. Getty Images<\/p>\n
Mills acknowledged that the women\u2019s game at the SCG had been \u201covershadowed\u201d when speaking at a press conference earlier on Friday<\/a>, but asked members and fans to support the AFLW team.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a historic weekend for the football club; it\u2019s our first double-header of AFLW and men\u2019s program together on the SCG,\u201d Mills said.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd whilst this has overshadowed it, I think it\u2019s an incredible, powerful moment that we\u2019ve come together, and we celebrate that moment of AFLW program out on the SCG.\u201d<\/p>\n McEvoy said the women\u2019s team had received a huge amount of support this week from the club and community, and encouraged fans to attend the double-header, despite the scandal surrounding the club.<\/p>\n \u201cThis week was supposed to be a really big day for our football club and the W program, so to be able to get that support \u2013 and we feel it a lot, we\u2019ve had a lot of messages through social media \u2013 and the best way that we can support us in this moment is get to the game on Sunday and hopefully break a record crowd that we once set a few years ago,\u201d McEvoy said.<\/p>\n Mills went and spoke with the women\u2019s team earlier in the week, where he \u201capologised for the actions of a few within our group\u201d – which McEvoy said she was and the other women\u2019s players appreciated.<\/p>\n Related Article \u201cHe [Mills] was quite remorseful on behalf of the men\u2019s program, and he\u2019s a really class human being, Millsy,\u201d McEvoy said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe respect he has for us and the respect we have for him and the way he\u2019s handled himself this week is second to none, and we couldn\u2019t have asked more from him as a captain of the men\u2019s program, and we really appreciate him taking the time to wrap his arms around us as a football club.\u201d<\/p>\n O\u2019Riordan urged fans to help break the Swans\u2019 AFLW home attendance record of 8264, set at their first game in 2022 at North Sydney Oval against St Kilda.<\/p>\n \u201cI think for us as a club to break a record like that after such a tough week and disappointing week for the club would be incredible,\u201d O\u2019Riordan said.<\/p>\n \u201cBut I think it would lift everyone and every woman in NSW and probably nationwide; it would lift them to show support, come out in your numbers and support these incredible women. I think that\u2019s what we\u2019re all after; I hope we can get that.\u201d<\/p>\n Save<\/p>\n You have reached your maximum number of saved items.<\/p>\n Remove items from your saved list<\/a> to add more.<\/p>\n![\"Sydney](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/bd3deb8215862c29bd724b65cefe1ae23ba3faea.jpeg\")
Sydney Swans AFLW coach Colin O\u2019Riordan and captain Lucy McEvoy on Friday.Sitthixay Ditthavong<\/p>\n![\"Swans](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/de71589071b2389ed4527ac8716305497cec1a24.jpeg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Billie](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/1785519555_783_771df3bbae20b8426017cdcf34f4ff4b37abc633edbf1ceba0d895f6da94446a.png\")
Billie Eder<\/a> is a sports reporter at The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via X<\/a> or email<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Updated August 21, 2026 \u2014 2:24pm,first published 1:25pm Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":862837,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-862836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/862836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=862836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/862836\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/862837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=862836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=862836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=862836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}