COVID WATCH

Selwood braces for virus impact on Cats sides

GEELONG captain Joel Selwood has conceded it is inevitable Covid will affect the Cats in 2022 and says it is crucial the club does what it can to ensure the effects of the virus are as limited as possible.

Multiple Sydney Swans players recently tested positive for Covid, while clubs across the competition have had scares with close contacts, resulting in training sessions being cancelled.

The Cats share training facilities with their AFLW team, which begins its season on January 8, and Selwood said while it seemed certain the club would be impacted in coming months, protecting both the women’s and men’s programs was a priority.

“It will definitely affect us and we have seen it with a couple of sides already, where guys have had to miss training and training has even been called off and they have gone and had tests during the day,” Selwood said.

“So we shouldn’t be blind to think it won’t happen to us at different times, because it will.

“It will probably happen during January and February, so we have to be careful with our girls’ program that we don’t cross over and we make sure we are not infecting the place and that they are doing the same, too.

“I don’t know how it sits right now, but it might mean an individual misses a couple of games, which in their (AFLW) season is really important when it is a 10-game season.

“Even for us, we don’t want any player missing, but I dare say we will probably go through that at some stage.”

Selwood, 33, has been a regular at pre-season sessions in the lead-up to the Christmas break as he prepares to enter his 16th year in the AFL.

He said the new members of Geelong’s strength and conditioning team had the Cats ready for the next phase of their 2022 preparation, which will kick off in early January.

“It was a good taste of what we will have for a block of training after Christmas,” he said.

“We got a two-week block in and there has been a bit of a change to how we train, with a little bit of running in between drills and then going straight into another drill and doing it under fatigue a bit.

“That will continue to build and our new staff got a real handle on us in the first 10 days we spent with them, so we are just touching the surface and we are really excited by what they can bring and everyone is looking to learn from them.”