Flamboyant full-forward Warwick Capper should have been leaping for joy after the Swans’ SCG match against Richmond in Round 8, 1986.

That match, played on May 18, saw Capper grab the only 10-goal haul in his 90 games in the red and white from 1983-87 and in 1991.

The only problem was that the Tigers pipped the Swans by a single point after the home side led by six points at the final change.

Capper’s 10 goals from a team total of 16 represented a remarkable achievement as it was the first time a Swans player had kicked 10 goals or more in a match since Jack Graham had kicked 10 goals against Geelong in Round 8, 1948.

Capper’s 10-goal haul also made him only the fifth South Melbourne/Sydney Swans player to reach a double-figure goals tally.

The first was Harold Robertson, who kicked 14 goals against St Kilda in a Round 12 match in 1919.

Then followed the great Bob Pratt, who kicked 10 goals or more in a match eight times, with a best tally of 15 (plus three behinds) in a Round 3 match against Essendon in 1934.

The other 10-up goalkicker was Lindsay White, who booted 10 goals or more in the red and white three times, with a best effort of 12, against Melbourne in Round 5, 1942.

White started his VFL career with Geelong in 1941, but crossed to South Melbourne when the Cats pulled out of the VFL in 1942 because of World War II.

He played just 25 games with South over the 1942-43 seasons before returning to Geelong and, apart from his three double figure goals hauls, kicked nine for South in the losing (to Essendon) 1942 preliminary final.

Capper might have been brilliant in bagging that 10-goal haul against Richmond, but could have won the game for the Swans if a shot for goal just two minutes from the final siren had not drifted away for a behind.

Capper kicked his first eight goals on debutant Tiger full-back Des Ryan and Richmond coach Tony Jewell then was forced into moving the experienced Jim Jess onto the Swans’ white-booted wonder.

Jewell explained after the match that he should have made the switch earlier in the game but explained that he did not want to “destroy the kid’s confidence”.

Jewell’s gamble paid off and Ryan went on to play 56 games with Richmond.

The Swans’ other good players in the narrowest of defeats were Dennis Carroll, Gerard Healy, Bernard Toohey and Paul Hawke.