Almost three weeks have passed since the 2020 AFL season was officially postponed, and I miss our great game.
Just like everyone out there, we as players miss our routines, we miss our workplace, the people within it and we miss playing footy.
We fully understand that this is much bigger than football, and we will resume playing once it is safe to do so. We know that the AFL are doing their best to put plans in place for every possibly scenario, and doing their best to protect the competition as we know it.
As a playing group, we met at the club on Monday 23rd March, the day after Gil McLachlan announced the suspension of the season, to be provided with an outline of what things will look like over the next few months. Our football boss Simon Lloyd and Chris Scott provided us with the harsh reality that the game and the club as we know it may never be the same.
We all grabbed our boots, any exercise equipment we could and walked out the door of GMHBA Stadium not knowing when we would be back.
Connection is powerful in a time of social distancing and isolation. And in this modern world, we are lucky to have the ability to keep in constant contact with our social network online. I wouldn’t want to imagine our world right now without the internet.
As players, we are currently scattered around the state and country, so making the effort to keep connected has never been more important.
I’ve stayed in Geelong, but a number of players have decided their period of isolation is better spent with their families back home. Esava Ratugolea has returned to his hometown of Cobram, Jordan Clark has flown back to Western Australia and Josh Jenkins is back home in Swan Hill.
The WhatsApp messenger app is getting a workout, our group chat provides constant conversation and entertainment.
There have been some great moments to celebrate as a group over the past few weeks, the arrival of little Sadie Rohan to the Cats family, Patrick Dangerfield hitting the big 3-0 and 21st birthdays for Gryan Miers and Lachie Fogarty.
Tom Hawkins is the club Quiz Master, most lunchtimes you will find big Hawk with a group huddled around as he tests their general knowledge with the newspaper quiz of the day. Hawk has now turned virtual Quiz Master, jumping onto the group chat at midday each day to throw a few questions to the group. I’m the first to admit, the quiz isn’t my forte. I’ll leave it up to the strong performers in Zach Tuohy and Tom Stewart.
Harry Taylor has many talents, but he’s been working on getting the group’s finances in order. Harry has been sharing his finance tips and helping the boys put personal budgets together.
WhatsApp has also given us the ability to share workouts and training sessions with one another.
A positive of the current situation is the amount of time we have to train. I’m self-motivated, I love keeping fit, going for a run and kicking the footy. I’m lucky that exercise is a passion of mine so my days are filled with moving my body as much as I can.
Under current restrictions, we are able to train with one other teammate. To mix up my solo training, earlier in the week I linked up with Sam Menegola for some ball skills, while Rhys Stanley and Zach Tuohy have been training together at a local oval.
We have to find ways to work within the regulations, whilst still keeping our touch and ball skills to the level they need to be. Once we get word on a season re-start date, we need to be ready to go.
