Cornes: Are the Lions satisfied? Or prepared to sacrifice?

Are the Brisbane Lions hellbent on winning a third straight premiership? Or are they satisfied with what they’ve achieved?

That was the narrative being floated in the wake of their 53-point Qualifying Final defeat to the Swans in Sydney on Saturday.

Many expected Chris Fagan’s Lions to breeze past the Swans given their personnel woes, but the opposite was true with the reigning back-to-back flag winners completely cast aside.

Kane Cornes acknowledges that Brisbane has been able to bounce back on several occasions this season, but just wonders where their mindset is right now.

“Sydney, would you believe, knocked off Brisbane by 53 points. They kicked 21.15.(141) on the back-to-back champs who everyone thought were just going to walk through and waltz into a home prelim final in a fortnight’s time,” Cornes said on SEN’s Fireball.

“That was not the case. My first thoughts start with how many of these can you have if you're Brisbane?

“Pretty much every time they've responded (to a big loss). Early days they lost by 44 to Sydney in their second game of the season. Then they respond, they win next three in a row.

“Then they had the really flat patch where they lost to Geelong by 41 in Round 10, 78 to the Giants, and then Freo by 25 in Round 12.

“Then they responded with a seven-game winning streak. You thought, ‘Gee, this is back on track for Brisbane’. Then they are absolutely smacked by Carlton by 76 points in Round 21.

“Then they responded against Hawthorn. They win by 10 goals the next week. And it's been about, ‘Well, we didn't really review it, we didn't look at the negatives, we focused on the positives. I reinforced what my players can do. We got the staff in. We had the big talk’.

“I reckon they've done that three times this year. I think they've had the positive pow-wow, reinforced what we're good at, remind everyone how good we are three times this year. And that's probably the only thing that you can do at this late stage in the season if you're the Brisbane Lions after getting done by 53 in a Qualifying Final.

“I’m never going to write Brisbane off, I’m not doing that, everyone has done it and it doesn't often work. But is it going to be as effective, is what I'm saying, the positive pow-wow this week? Or are there serious doubts amongst this group?”

Co-host David King wondered what the Lions can do to correct what has gone wrong on a few occasions in 2026.

“Well, it's a really unanswerable question, isn't it? Can you gather defensively at this stage of the year or, to steal one of Daniel Hoyne’s terms, you are what you are?

“And then do they have to say, ‘Well, we've got to win it on attack with aggression, we’ve got to play expansive footy, and you know what, if they score a hundred points against us that's fine because we'll score 120’.

“They've coughed up 141 and it's not so much the number, it was the method for me. So when you look at the centre bounce stuff and the clearance work that was going on - at clearances, they were beaten 57 points to 22. Now that's where all the stars are for Brisbane. That's where they all live. That's the Ashcrofts and Josh Dunkley, Lachie Neale, Zac Bailey going through there. You’ve got the lot of them going through there.

“When you look at the Swans’ lineup and when we talk about those that are missing, this is where it hurts the most. So they lean on Jai Serong to go in there. He went in the centre bounces 28 times, the most of any other player with the exception of James Rowbottom, who'd been a half-forward for 10 weeks.

“So if you get those two and then Angus Sheldrick comes in and does what he does, just does enough to be a good contributor, they should have belted him in there. They should have taken them to the cleaners. But again, footy between the ears, you lose games on attitude and application.”

Cornes also wonders if trade speculation surrounding two-time Brownlow Medallist Neale and to a lesser extent Zac Bailey could be somewhat of a distraction at this point of the season.

“If there are distractions going on then it's really difficult,” Cornes added.

“So I look at Lachie Neale and I hear that he's ringing Collingwood - and I'm sure this is true because you wouldn't go with it if it's not - to find out what numbers are available in the lead-up to this game.

“I don't know, is that a player that is fully buying in to win another premiership? Sort of what I've been saying all year.

“When you're touring Collingwood the day before a game, are you fully buying into the cause? Is Cam Rayner happy with the two premierships that he's won or is he fully buying in? Is Zac Bailey worrying about an extra hundred grand on his contract or is he fully buying into winning a third premiership?

“I don't know, I don't know, but it doesn't look like it. It doesn't look like it because I know what it does look like and that's Hawthorn and that's Sydney and that's what you have to do if you want to win a premiership.

“I’m just not sure right now. Yep, they can respond and yep, they'll respond this week. They'll beat Adelaide, no worries, and we'll see you prelim final day against Hawthorn at the MCG and we'll find out a bit more about them there.

“But I'm just not sure this group is willing to sacrifice like they have done in the previous couple of years.”

The Lions' season remains alive with a cut-throat Semi Final fixture against Adelaide at the Gabba on Saturday night.

Listen to the Lions discussion below: