Ash McGrath will play his 150th game this weekend down in Tasmania against the Hawks.
Ash has represented this football club extremely well over the years. A premiership player in his younger days and now a reliable running defender, Ash is a guy who gives as much life off the field as he does on the field.
Another pleasing effort was Jack Redden who was announced as this week's Rising Star for his performance against the Saints.
Jack is improving his game every week. He is now a player who is respected and looked up to for his tackling efforts by his team-mates.
That takes the Club’s tally of Rising Star nominations to three for the year. Considering there have only been 15 rounds played, it’s a really impressive effort by Rocky, Toddy and Reddo.
This week’s game down in Tassie will be great for a few of the boys on our list.
We have five Tassie boys at the Club - Tom Collier, Bart McCulloch, Aaron Cornelius, Ryan Harwood and Justin Sherman - which I think is the most in the AFL.
Speaking with my housemate Tommy, I know he is looking forward to getting home for the first time since October last year.
I too am excited about this week’s game. I have never been to Tassie before and from what I hear from the boys, the ground in Launceston is one of the nicest going around.
The boys can’t wait to take on Hawthorn this weekend. We had a great training session this morning and we feel we made some massive improvements during our game against the Saints last weekend.
Unfortunately we didn’t get the win, but the effort from the boys and our ability to work together as a team was the best it’s been since our last win - which was against Collingwood back in Round 10.
Unfortunately for my other housemate Matt Austin, his year is over.
He broke his leg and did some damage to his ankle joint which means he will probably be right just in time for the pre-season.
Austo’s a professional guy and I have no doubts from talking with him that he appreciates the upcoming work he will have to do to get his body right for next year.
In what can be quite a challenging situation, he has been fantastic in remaining quite positive around home.
