Power praises the passion

LUKE Power has one message for his Brisbane Lions teammates ahead of their first finals campaign in five years: play with passion.

Power was one of the catalysts for Saturday night’s incredible come-from-behind victory against Port Adelaide, and the Lions vice-captain is urging his team to use the win as a springboard.

He had 31 possessions and seven marks in a typically tireless performance.

And when he talks of passion, it’s hard not to listen, as the left-footer is consistently among the Lions’ best and always gives it his all.

“One thing about footy, and I’m getting a bit philosophical, but I think you’ve got to have passion,” he said.

“I think you’ve got to have passion to do things and you’ve got to have passion if you want to be a good player at this level.

“You’ve got to have passion to come in and you’ve got to love what you do and that’s something over the next few weeks we’ve got to install into our team and come and be passionate about what we do.”

The Lions turned around a 47-point deficit into a memorable 15-point win on Saturday night, but it wasn’t just the usual names that did the damage.

While Power was his team’s best, he was quick to point out some other instances that helped inspire the Lions.

“There were a couple of acts,” he said. "Mitch Clark coming back (after dehydration), Cheynee Stiller going back with the flight, and Justin Sherman’s chase in the third quarter was great".

With Power in his 12th season of senior football, he said the Lions’ younger brigade added something to the squad on the cusp of their first finals appearance since 2004.

“They just bring so much excitement to the place. Sammy Sheldon is a real happy kid who is always buzzing around and that’s what youth does.

“You’ve got Sheldon, (Jack) Redden, (Daniel) Rich; he’s the same as Sheldon, just lifts the morale of the place".

He said a win like Saturday night’s lifted everyone for training in preparation for the Round 22 clash with the Sydney Swans.

 “You don’t want to be cannon fodder coming into the finals,” Power said.

“We want good momentum coming in. It’s just the vibe of the place when you have a win; it’s just a lot better place to be around. When you lose, it can be a pretty dark. Before tonight we hadn’t won for three weeks, if we lost it would have been four weeks and it would have been in the back of our minds.

“So we’ve got to go next week to Sydney and make sure we go into the finals with form.”