HAILING A SELFLESS SERVANT
Players salute top Cat,Taylor
AT the end of Geelong’s main training session on Wednesday night, most of the Cats players walked off the ground with a grand final on their minds.
Not Harry Taylor.
As he has done so many times before, the veteran instead stayed out on the track with first-year midfielder Cooper Stephens for 15 minutes, imitating a forward making leads to help the youngster sharpen up his kicking.
That is just who Taylor is. Instead of getting caught up in the thoughts about what could be his final AFL game in just three days time, he chose to give up more of his time to help a teammate.
When he announces his retirement, Taylor will be recognised by all outside the club as a marvellous key defender, a backbone in defence connecting the glory era at Geelong to the current day.
But within the club, he will simply be remembered as an outstanding teammate.
For youngsters joining the club it has become a right of passage to spend hour after hour picking the brain of the West Australian, particularly for defenders.
“From day dot I have asked (Taylor) on field, off field, everything under the sun type questions and he is just really knowledgeable and takes the time with the young boys and just continues to help them improve,” Mark Blicavs said this week.
“And if he helps them improve, then the Geelong footy club will be in a better position once he finishes up.”
Brought onto the AFL list from Geelong’s VFL program, Tom Stewart also drifted towards Taylor in his early years.
Now a member of the leadership group at the Cats, Stewart said he owes plenty to his early moments with Taylor.
“The one thing I will miss about Harry are the little intricacies of conversation you have with him about the game,” Stewart said this week.
“He is like a father figure for me in that backline.
“He is a great person to learn off and he has a lot of knowledge and he’s really good to just spend some time with and talk about life and footy.”
FITTING RIGHT IN
THE story of Taylor’s matureage drafting has been told many times over the years.
The 21-year-old was plucked from East Fremantle with the 17th overall pick at the 2007 AFL Draft and the key back walked into one of the greatest teams seen in the modern era.
With All-Australian centre half-back Matthew Egan suffering what would be a careerending foot injury, the coaches placed Taylor’s magnet on the board in his spot.
And that is where it would stay for 13 seasons.
For forward Steve Johnson, once the ball went in Taylor’s direction, he knew he could start planning an attack.
“He came straight into our team and has just performed consistently over his whole career, he’s still performing at a high level right now,” Johnson said earlier this year.
“I guess when the ball used to go into the backline and there was a 50-50 contest to be won, you would be pretty confident that Harry would beat his man or be dropping into the hole to take an intercept mark.
“It has been an unbelievable career for him.”
Taylor’s legendary shutdown role on St Kilda star Nick Riewoldt would help
Geelong claim the 2009 premiership after heartbreak the year before.
In 2011, he shifted as the team needed once Travis Cloke had Collingwood on top in that grand final and played a role in claiming his second flag.
FROM the very first of his 279 games, Taylor looked like a seasoned veteran.
With sure hands and a reliable kick, he was the prototypical tall defender.
Taylor is always seen at the back of the Geelong playing group as they run out for a match, alongside his good friend Lachie Henderson.
“Harry and I have been together for five years now, I have played against him my whole career and we were in the same draft,” Henderson said this year.
“We know each other really well and how we tick.
“Those little things like running out with him with the team when we are at the back, those are the little things you remember from your career when it’s all over. It’s a great partnership (we have).”
As a youngster trying to find his feet, Jake Kolodjashnij always admired the left-footer but was even more impressed when he got to know Taylor.
“Harry is super, he is someone I have really looked up to,” Kolodjashnij said this week.
“I was already a big Harry Taylor fan before I got to the club and then just seeing all the work that he puts in each week, he ticks all the boxes and is the ultimate professional.
“He is one of the nicest guys you will meet off the playing field as well.”
THE inevitable questions came in the lead up to Saturday night’s grand final about whether this would be Taylor’s final match.
Forever a pragmatist, he said he would sit down and look at all the options after the season ends as to whether he plays on again.
Taylor has committed to living his career day-by-day in its final years.
“I just appreciate the way he attacks each moment and the detail he has,” Stewart said.
“He is such a diligent leader and he leads not just by what he said but the way he goes about it.
“I’ll just miss spending time with him and playing footy with him because he is just a great competitor and a great bloke.”
As they run out of the race together — for potentially the last time — Taylor and his skipper Joel Selwood will play in the same team for the 260th time, drawing them equal as the 22nd most by any duo in AFL/VFL history.
It will take a supreme effort to get past Richmond and claim the silverware, but Selwood knows his beloved teammate will do everything he can so that the pair can share their third premiership together.
“There is huge confidence that he will go and get his job done,” Selwood said this year.
“(Taylor is) a great teammate, an even better person and someone that I trust that will make sure we get it done.”
— TOM STEWART
GARY ABLETT
Pick: No. 40, 2001 national draft Local club: Modewarre
“John Edsall, he was our development manager … (and) they’re training the under-15s squad and they picked 25 kids for the Geelong squad and Gary Ablett Jr was the last one picked. He was picked because he was a very skilful player but he was very small. He played and he ended up playing for Victoria, so it was a good decision by John Edsall because there was a bit of pressure on. As a 16-year-old, we didn’t bring him in because we wanted to give him time to mature, so he just played out at Modewarre. We brought him in as a 17-year-old … he was still maturing (but) he had a really good season for us. He played for Vic Country … and of course Geelong drafted him as a 17-year-old.”
PATRICK DANGERFIELD
Pick: No. 10, 2007 national draft Local club: Anglesea
“In those days, you could get drafted at 17. We knew he was going to get drafted, but Adelaide took him. We played him on ball and then all the AFL clubs started ringing the AFL and going, ‘Listen, this kid’s already drafted, can we not have him playing in the midfield because no one can get the ball off him’. He’d just dominate — burst out of the middle like he does at Geelong. We were halfway through a game one day … (and) I said, ‘Put him up forward for the last half and isolate him in the forward 50m’. I think he kicked seven or eight goals. That’s exactly what he’s doing in the AFL at the moment.”
JACK HENRY (right)
Pick: No. 16, 2016 rookie draft Local club: St Mary’s
“I heard it on the TV the other night when Jack Henry went forward and kicked that goal that he wouldn’t have played forward too often, but when he played for us he played on the wing and he was a winger we pushed forward. There’s no doubt the game he got drafted off was at GMHBA Stadium because I know Stephen Wells was there. He went forward from the wing and kicked five goals. Obviously he’s made a name for himself as a really good athletic defender for Geelong.”