If you think that Geelong wrecking ball Tom Atkins is complacent after a season in which he became a mainstay in a premiership-winning midfield, then you don’t know Tom Atkins.
The Atkins story was oft told throughout 2022.
The former skipper of Geelong’s VFL side landed a spot on the Cats' senior list back in 2018. He was tried in a number of roles, as a pressure forward and a lockdown defender mainly, before a combination of injuries and the conservative management of mainstays Joel Selwood and Patrick Dangerfield, handed the 27-year-old an opportunity in the middle that he never relinquished.
The rest, as they say, is history.
Atkins, speaking with SEN on Wednesday, said that he won’t be taking his spot for granted.
“No way,” he said.
“I think you'll see from the pickups that we had in the offseason we've got some quality players in so you definitely can't get comfortable at all, and that's what makes us such a good team.
“I think the blokes that got left out of the AFL team for the Grand Final shows where we're at as a club and that shows how strong our list is. I think it would be an issue for the Geelong Footy Club if blokes are getting comfortable with their spots.”
Atkins famously told a Channel 7 interviewer minutes after he almost singlehandedly dragged the Cats over the line with a 12 disposal, seven contested possession, five intercept, final term in a Round 19 clash against Port Adelaide in Adelaide, that he saw himself as a fringe player, just happy to be in the team.
“There’s a lot of great guys in the VFL who are missing out at the moment so I think I owe it to them to play well, I owe it to them because I’m on the fringe,” he said at the time.
Clearly, that attitude hasn’t changed, despite what came after, which would come as no surprise to anyone who knows Tom Atkins.
“The grind of being an AFL footballer is just trying to find a spot in the team,” he said this week.
“I started off as a high forward putting pressure on, and when I got squeezed out for the 2020 Grand Final, it was pretty obvious that I wasn't getting back in. So then you try your hand in defence and from there just try and stay in the team and then that opportunity came through the midfield.
“I'm sure there are a lot of guys in the League who just want to be in the 22 that play on the weekend so you do whatever you can to get a spot.”
