JOEL’S MUM ON THOSE KNOCKS
MAREE Selwood has seen almost everything there is to see in football.
It comes with the territory of being a mother to four boys who have played in the AFL.
But when Maree made her way to her seat before Geelong’s Round 14 clash with Fremantle three years ago, she could not have imagined what was about to unfold.
Less than a minute into the game, her third son, Cats captain Joel, copped a knock to the head and fell to the ground.
He did not move.
Maree’s heart sank.
As her son lay motionless on the Kardinia Park turf, her mind raced.
Husband Bryce would normally have been next to her but on this occasion former Geelong ruckman Zac Smith was in that seat.
She could not look. Eventually, Selwood moved.
At first, only a bit. Then he stood up. Then he ran from the field. Every person at the ground cheered, having held their collective breath only moments earlier as they waited and hoped for the best.
For Maree, this has been her lot.
Having a son — or sons — who play football can be tough, but particularly so when they play the way Joel Selwood has for 299 games.
Before his 300th match for Geelong, on Saturday, Maree admits that incident was the scariest she has endured, but says she remains in awe of her son and how he plays the game.
“It is horrible sometimes,” she said.
“He has had some ordinary clashes and has come out very bloody, but it was that game against Fremantle (in 2017) in the first few seconds where he got hit and Zac Smith was sitting next to me, and Joel went down and my heart just sank because he wasn’t moving.
“I couldn’t even look at the football, I kept looking at Zac, and I said, ‘Zac, just tell me he is moving’, and he couldn’t tell me at first.
“It took a while and then he said, ‘it’s all right, Maree, I saw him move’. It is a sigh of relief to think, ‘thank God he is alive’, but then Joel being the tough nut he is insisted on running off the ground.
“That one really scared me and I spoke to him after the game and told him that but he said, ‘Mum, I am not changing my game, that is the way I play’. So there are the horrible moments but then he does the most amazing things and you think ‘how on earth did you do that?’ so there are wonderful times as well.”
Selwood will become only the fifth Geelong player in its 161-year history to notch 300 games when he runs out against Gold Coast, and while it is fitting he will do so at the ground he has made his own, it is regrettable those same fans will not be there to see it.
But as his dad, Bryce, recalls, the early indications from doctors when Joel was young was that he would have been lucky to play sport at the elite level at all, let alone for as long as he has across a distinguished career.
“In the year just before he got drafted he had some knee problems and he had a few operations on it to try to rectify the problem,” Bryce said.
“The last surgeon said he didn’t think Joel would be able to play a high level of sport and I knew having seen the twins play and what Joel had shown in his early years how much skill he had.
“So I just thought that if he didn’t have a chance to live his dream and play AFL football that it would be a tragedy for him, but also the football world, because I knew how good he could be.
“I am a bit of a show-off dad with that comment, but he proved the doctors who looked at him wrong. They said he wouldn’t play 50 games and he is coming up to game 300, and that just speaks to his willpower to achieve what he wanted to.”
He concedes he has “held his breath” on countless occasions when watching his son in action, but says he has always had a competitive streak from a young age, which was borne out of his relationship with older twin brothers, Adam and Troy, and younger brother, Scott.
For Maree, seeing Joel in action on the big stage seemed inevitable.
“We always knew there was something special about him and we thought he would achieve something,” she said.
“Maybe not quite this milestone but he always showed signs from a young age he would do something special.”
BACKYARD DUELS
THE competitive streak in all of the Selwoods stems from childhood rivalries that were established in the backyard of their Bendigo home.
Adam and Troy might have been four years older than Joel, and a further two years advanced on Scott, but it did not stop the younger siblings wanting to knock off their elder brothers whenever they could.
But the twins never made life easy — Joel and Scott had to earn every kick, every mark, and every touch of the footy they had.
As fate would have it, Scott and Adam would end up together at West Coast, with the youngest Selwood assigned to stopping Joel whenever the Cats and Eagles met.
It was Adam, though, who would find himself in close contact with the Geelong skipper in Round 20, 2012, in a Friday night match in front of a packed Subiaco crowd.
“It was quite a unique situation going into that game because Scott was tagging Joel and the incident played out beautifully,” Adam said.
“Joel received a hospital handball and Scott was chasing him down, and I was on Steve Johnson sitting at the back of the stoppage.
“It was 20 years in the making where, if ever I had a chance to clean up my brother in front of 40,000 people, here it was. Being the older brother, I did it, but I came off second best.
“I had been thinking this was my time to shine but it ended up one of the most embarrassing moments of my life. The hit took the wind out of me, and it hurt him, but what actually flowed out of that was he got his kick away in the moment, which was an amazing kick and it ended up being marked and then they got a goal from that play.
“So I was sitting there thinking, ‘ even when I try to clean you up, you can still somehow get a kick away and Geelong score a goal from it’.
“I had some tough moments against Geelong and had to play on Gary Ablett and Steve Johnson, and then the moment I could clean my brother up it still didn’t go my way.”
Remarkably, Joel was given a reprimand for pushing his brother as he tried to catch his breath after the hit, but that incident only further highlighted his desire to win every contest regardless of the opponent or situation.
It is something Troy has enjoyed watching up close having come to the Cats after his career with the Brisbane Lions finished.
Troy was captain of Geelong’s VFL team while Joel was skipper of the AFL side, before moving into an administrative and then recruiting role.
But he says while he is proud of his brother for all of his on-field achievements, and admits he would gladly turn on the TV to watch him play even if he was not his brother, it is what he sees of him off field every day that stands out.
“The thing I have appreciated most since coming to Geelong and being able to share the journey with him is witnessing how he goes about his work off the field and looking at the way he prepares himself mentally and physically to the nth degree of professionalism just to ensure that his standards never slip on game day,” Troy said.
“What I have been most amazed by, though, is his care and support for his team and the individuals, but also the staff and the community. He just seems to get the whole picture of what it means to be not only a Geelong player but a Geelong captain and a leader of the community.
“He just does it naturally and it is in his DNA, and being in these off-field roles I have observed how he has supported everyone from young kids coming into the system to the fringe players who aren’t sure where they belong in the whole scheme of things, to supporting players who might have committed a misdemeanour or a teammate who is down on form.
“He is one of the first people who is there to put an arm over someone’s shoulder.”
SELWOOD V SELWOOD
AS the youngest of four brothers to play AFL football, Scott Selwood was blessed to have a unique perspective on what it took to reach the elite level.
But the twins left home as he was starting high school, so much of his football education at home came from observing Joel and the professionalism he displayed beyond his years.
Scott has tagged his brother in finals matches for the Eagles and also played alongside him when he joined the Cats at the end of 2015, so he understands him perhaps better than most and credits much of h his own career to Joel for showing him what was required to survive and thrive at the top.
“I’ve seen him from every angle and it has been quite incredible,” he said.
“Troy and Adam had played AFL but they were six years older than me and I didn’t understand what the next step was, so having Joel there was really helpful.
“Looking back now he was way too professional for his age. He knew what it took just through reading articles or emulating things in Troy and Adam’s program, and I don’t think I would have got to where I got without watching Joel.
“He was always willing to come out of himself and once he understood something he tried to teach it to the person next to him, regardless of where they were at with their development.”
At Geelong, Scott saw a different side of his brother again, and says he is grateful for the opportunity to have been able to call him a teammate as well as his best mate.
“It was almost like coming back to play with your best mate,” he said.
“But your brother is the captain, he was in the same midfield line, my locker was almost next to his, so there was some apprehension around how that might be, because I was proud of where I had got to as a leader and a footballer at West Coast, but immediately he let me be my own person and celebrated the fact that I go about things a little bit differently.
“He does that with every single individual at the footy club, too, and I think that is what makes the Geelong Football Club so great, because they celebrate differences and that is why you see so many guys who get traded perform really well.
“Joel’s ability to make sure everyone feels connected and valued at the club is extremely important and I think that is one of his great’s attributes.”
HOME SUPPORT
THERE is perhaps nobody outside of a fellow footballer who truly understands what AFL players go through just to get themselves up for matches every week other than a wife or partner.
Joel and Britt Selwood were married in January but the pair had been together long before their marriage, giving Britt an insight like few others into what the three-time Carji Greeves medallist has endured.
She has seen the preparation before games — pasta every night before match day — and the heat packs, the ice baths, the stretching, she has seen the early morning recovery sessions, has heard the groans as he wakes in the
morning and has watched him at every turn become the player he has.
Britt, like the rest of the Selwood clan and all of the Geelong supporters so desperate to pay tribute to one of their club’s finest players, will be unable to attend Saturday’s match due to restrictions around crowd attendance.
But she says it will be just as emotional watching on from home as she reflects on her pride not only in her husband the footballer, but in her husband the man.
“He gives us a heart attack every time he plays, he is just always head first and he is always ruining his beautiful face,” Britt said.
“You are always cringing, but as much as you want the boys to win, you just hope he gets through without a bandage on his head or getting concussed and stretchered off. It is quite hard to watch sometimes.
“I have seen him limp out of bed so many times so I actually don’t know how he has got to 300 games. The thing about Joel that I am really proud about though is it is never about him, it is always about the team and what is best for the team.
“He has an incredible presence on and off the ground and he gives back to everyone around him at the football club.
“He has done a hell of a lot and it is going to be quite emotional to see him playing.”