Even though most football experts gave the Brisbane Lions very little chance of toppling the high-flying Sydney Swans prior to last Saturday’s match, Senior Coach Michael Voss said he walked away “shattered” by his team’s 47-point defeat.

Voss said the Lions had taken great confidence into the match, but failed to match their more highly fancied opponents when the heat was turned up in the third quarter.

“I walk away shattered,” Voss said.

“I think we’ve been in good enough form where we’ve got to start expecting more from these guys.”

“Part of this challenge of trying to get to the next level is trying to execute more often and being able to do it under pressure.”

“That top echelon of sides will usually have 15-20 minutes during matches where they want to own you. You have to think through that and we couldn’t.”

“That was pretty disappointing, because in the end it worked out to be the difference between the two teams.”

Sydney forward Sam Reid proved the biggest thorn in the Lions’ side with six goals.

Such was Reid's dominance in attack, that Voss was forced to shift Daniel Merrett back to his regular post at full-back late in the game to stem the Swans' onslaught.

But the Lions Coach said that it would prove a valuable learning experience for young defender Niall McKeever who was constantly under pressure.

“As coach, you’ve got to put belief in these guys that they can do the job, and also fight back,” Voss said.

Josh Drummond, meanwhile, believed that McKeever didn’t receive sufficient support from his fellow defenders.

“You saw how well Sydney defended as a group against Browny, but we unfortunately weren’t able to get that same support (for Niall),” Drummond said.

“It’s probably our own fault as a defence that the ball was coming straight back. The game was going very quick and we were going quick straight back at it. We just needed to take stock when we won the footy back, try and slow it down and give ourselves a chance to set ourselves up again defensively.”