McGrath to tough it out

LARA veteran Keiron McGrath says retiring while the club is at its lowest point on-field would be the “easy option”. Instead, the reserves captain will lead his side out for game 300 when the Cats play St Joseph’s away from home. The 36-year-old’s playing record doesn’t include his junior career, which started at under-11s in the early 1990s. But it does include just three wins in the past four seasons, highlighting the selflessness of the ultimate clubman. “I think it’s kind of the easy option if you don’t turn up and deal with the problems and try and fix them,” McGrath said. “I think it probably looks like it’s tough from the outside but from the inside a lot of things have been put in place for the future of the club. “I’m the captain of the twos so there’s more in it for me to be there than not. I don’t think I’ve missed a game in at least five years now.” But poor results weren’t always the case. “Early days I thought it (success) was just going to happen,” McGrath said. “I played in an under18 premiership with Lara in 1999. In 2000, seniors and reserves played in a grand final and we both lost. In 2001, we (the reserves) won it and in 2002 the seniors won it.”

The milestones will keep coming if he pulls on the boots again next season, with Aidan Courtney’s club record within reach.

“I’ve got a wife and a little daughter so that takes up a lot of time, but if I play on next year I’ll surpass Aidan Courtney who holds the club record, so a lot of people have said, ‘You’ve got this far, you might as well keep going’,” he said.

“But it’s a one-year-at-atime scenario.”

McGrath said he hadn’t reflected on what the 300game milestone meant.

“It doesn’t mean a lot at the moment — it probably will when I’m older and footy’s gone,” he said.

“Just to be able to do something for as long a period as I have, I’m quite humbled in getting to that stage.

“We’ve got a lot of kids developing, but it’s just about putting the 30-50 games behind them so they can become better players.

“You look at the St Joey’s, Leopolds and Colacs, a lot of them came through their juniors and then you’ve just got to recruit the missing pieces.

“I still feel young enough to play footy; it’s just success — because success happened at the start you’d love that fairytale ending.”