CASSIDY CALLS TIME ON STELLAR CAREER
ONE of Tasmania’s most prolific goalkickers has called time on his career with Lindisfarne playing coach Michael Cassidy hanging up the boots after more than a decade toying with the state’s best key defenders.
The 37-year-old announced his retirement on social media last Friday and cited a desire to spend more time with his family and increased work commitments as the overriding reason.
“It was a pretty tough decision in the end,” Cassidy told The Mercury. “I had the conversation with the wife and with the kids and we realised it was probably time for me to spend at little bit more time at home given I’d also taken up a new role at work.”
It’s been a long and fruitful career for the towering redhead who played more than 300 senior games and kicked 650 plus goals across his four-club career.
First picked as a 17-year-old for Claremont in 2005, Cassidy took his talents to Anzac Park for the Two Blues for two years before a desire to test himself at a higher level saw him join Hobart in 2008.
“I had a real thirst to play for the Tasmania in the VFL but I couldn’t do that unless I was playing in the highest competition possible so I chose to go to Hobart and really enjoyed my time at the TCA over five years,” he said.
“That gave me the opportunity to play 10 Devils games which are right up there as a career highlight.”
After 72 games and 143 goals for Hobart, Cassidy ventured to Lauderdale where he would terrorise the Tasmanian State League for a further four seasons, that included 77 games and 139 goals, before a return to
Lindisfarne in 2017 saw him achieve his greatest feats as a player and coach.
“I was pretty lucky to go to Lindisfarne when I did,” Cassidy said.
“Dan Willing had done such a good job with recruitment and the way he’d built that club up and I was just lucky enough to come on board as coach once he left and the club was still in a strong position. You obviously add your own flavour here and there along the way and clearly getting Josh Green in this year was a big thing given his experience and the form he was in.”
While the three-time premiership player said the 2022 season would be hard to top as a career highlight, given the Two Blues went through undefeated and claimed the premiership, he singled out two games as ones he considered his personal best along the journey. The first, the 2018 SFL grand final where he dominated at North Hobart Oval against Huonville to finish with seven goals and win the Gorringe-Martin Medal as best on ground and the other, a VFL preseason game where he kicked four goals against Collingwood.
“Last year is hard to top,” he said.
“Going through a season undefeated and winning a flag is pretty special but also that 2018 grand final from a personal playing perspective was one of my best and a Devils pre-season game was also one that sticks in the memory.”
While Cassidy said there was a range of things he’d miss about pulling on the boots every Saturday, he said the pre-game rituals with his children and being around his teammates were the biggest ones.