Permission puts Pie big man in shades
COLLINGWOOD big man Mason Cox had to wait until the last minute to gain permission to wear his prescription sunglasses in a practice match against Hawthorn on Friday.
The AFL confirmed at 2.40pm on Friday it had approved the eyewear for use this season after reviewing a submission from the Magpies.
Cox has been trialling the eyewear after a horror run with career-threatening eye injuries in the past three years, requiring six operations.
The 211cm American wanted to wear the eyewear in a match situation when the Magpies faced Hawthorn in a practice game at Morwell on Friday. The game was due to start at 4pm.
Cox recently spoke about how the glasses had helped him.
“You are kind of nervous the first day (wearing them), then everyone just kind of gets used to it,” he told Channel 7. “A few of the players have tried them on and gone, ‘That’s not too bad actually’.
“One of the biggest problems I had was my pupil would not constrict again, so going under lights is essentially like looking into the sun.
“There is a different intensity of tint, so you have got some that are a bit darker and some that are a bit lighter. Depending on how much light there is on the day will be the selection of tint I will use on game day.
“It’s something in other sports that is kind of normalised, but no one has really seen it in AFL.”
The 30-year-old first needed eye surgery in 2019 after suffering a torn retina against the Gold Coast following an accidental poke in the eye.
During the operation, it was discovered his other retina was also detached, dating to an incident in a contest from the Magpies’ 2018 grand final loss to West Coast.
The surgeries left Cox “legally blind” for a period.
He was forced to spend 45 minutes of every hour lying on his back as part of his recovery in a dark room and was unable to look at screens.