Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
AAP
AAP
Sport
Oliver Caffrey

Lions tame Tigers in AFLW qualifying final

Jesse Wardlaw (l) celebrates a goal for Brisbane in their AFLW qualifying final win over Richmond. (Jason O'BRIEN/AAP PHOTOS) (AAP)

AFLW premiership favourites Brisbane have done it easy in their qualifying final, cruising to a 17-point victory over Richmond at Metricon Stadium.

The Tigers, who were making their AFLW finals debut after entering the competition in 2020, defended valiantly but were outclassed by the Lions on Saturday.

The minor premiers only loss for the season came against Richmond at Punt Rd Oval back in September, and the Lions were determined to turn the tables.

Richmond captain Katie Brennan snapped a terrific goal to level the scores after five minutes but Brisbane controlled most of the contest from there to prevail 5.9 (39) to 3.4 (22).

The commanding victory allows the Lions to have a week off and progress to a home preliminary final as they seek to win their second AFLW premiership.

Brisbane had winners all across the ground and were able to curb the influence of star Tigers midfielder Mon Conti, who is favourite to claim her first league best-and-fairest award later this month.

Lions spearhead Jesse Wardlaw opened the scoring to become the first player to kick 20 goals in an AFLW season.

Goals to Cathy Svarc, Sophie Conway and Dakota Davidson blew the game open in the second term as the Lions took a 22-point lead into halftime.

Brisbane dominated inside-50s 36-22 and could have won by more if they had kicked straighter and the Tigers' defence was not so resilient.

"Really stoked to get the dub (win), not just to get to the prelim but also to get the win back over the Tigers," Conway told the Seven Network.

"We had a disappointing loss to them in round-five so we wanted to come back out here and play our brand of footy and our style.

"I felt like we did that for parts of today but maybe not all four quarters."

Reigning league best-and-fairest winner Emily Bates and fellow Lions premiership player Ally Anderson were the leading possession winners on the ground with 21 each.

Richmond looked more threatening in the final quarter as Brennan added to her major in the first term with two more to finish with all three of the Tigers' goals.

Other Richmond players had gilt-edged opportunities to reduce the deficit even further but they were still able to win the final quarter.

Richmond will meet the winner of Saturday night's elimination final between Geelong and North Melbourne.

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.