Scheer’s will and determination has her up and running three months after her second knee reconstruction
Teenaged football sensation Chloe Scheer shows determination and strength as she rehabilitates from her second knee reconstruction in two years.
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The Shed floor — the indoor training facility at the West Lakes headquarters of the Adelaide Football Club — is big, but it’s not enormous.
A square patch of artificial grass, it’s a place where the male and female Crows squads can perform warm-up kicks and handball drills. A social soccer game or two for staff is not uncommonly played there either.
But on Friday, the Shed floor belonged to Chloe Scheer: the high-marking, goal-snapping teenager who played her first season of AFLW this year.
There she was, with the Shed floor all to herself, undertaking her first tentative run since a knee reconstruction in April.
What a 2019 season it had been for Scheer since she made her AFLW debut in round one. It was one that included not only a premiership medal, but a rising star nomination, stints in the star-studded Crows midfield, kicking eight goals and picking up a solid average disposal count of 10.
However, her season came to a devastating end in the second quarter of March’s AFLW grand final against Carlton.
Moments after she took a spectacular mark in front of a record-breaking crowd of 53,034 that resulted in a Danielle Ponter goal, she fell to the Adelaide Oval grass clutching her right knee after rupturing her anterior cruciate ligament.
It was devastating not just because of the injury itself, but because Scheer knew she was facing her second knee construction — and a long road to recovery — in two years. She did her left knee in July, 2017 playing for Modbury in the SAWFL.
That’s a lot to face for someone who is yet to turn 20.
“I just remember chasing the ball, I think EJ (Eloise Jones) tapped it on to me … we were only 10m out in front of goal and I went down to pick the ball up and one of the Carlton girls fell on my leg and I felt the pain and I heard the noise that it makes,” the 19-year-old recalls.
“And that was it. I knew. I’d done my other knee before … that was hard because I was looking to get drafted and that interrupted that (Scheer was instead drafted at No. 37 in 2018).
“I had a long 17-month journey until I could actually play footy again. And I finally got back and at the highest level, and then decided to do my other one.”
But Scheer is remarkably stoic about it all: “It is what it is,” she simply says.
“That’s the risk you take with footy.”
And, boy, did she do her knee: “My knee was bad. A lot worse than my first one. I tore my meniscus, my lateral, my medial I had to get that trimmed, and then did some other ligament on the side and then a clean snap of the ACL.
“So it was a good job.”
As such, recalling the Crows 45-point grand final win is bitter sweet. After all, as everyone was celebrating, Scheer was being wheeled around the changerooms by best friend (and fellow Crows draftee) Katelyn Rosenzweig, knowing what lay ahead of her.
She wasn’t alone in that predicament, though: the grand final’s best on ground and her co-captain Erin Phillips was on crutches nearby, having also ruptured her ACL during the game.
“I’m still just lucky to be a part of it, really,” Scheer says. “We were just unlucky with those injuries … we won the grand final and that’s what you want, but at the end of the day both teams had a few injuries which is not good, especially serious injuries like Erin and I.
“But these things still happen. What can you do?”
Well, you carry on. And that’s just what Scheer is doing. As soon as her surgery was complete on April 6, she started her rehabilitation to regain full fitness and she’s being rated as a 50-50 chance of making it back for the 2020 AFLW season.
It’s not easy, though.
“I don’t know how to describe it unless you’ve actually had surgery and gone through it. But it is hard and there are times when you think you’re never going to be able to bend your knee again and get to full extension and things like that, so it plays with your mind a bit.
“I’ve just found it a lot easier this time, even though the injury was worse. I just think the fact that I’ve been through it before, I’m a lot further along that I was with my first knee.”
Scheer credits her partner, Danielle Stewart, as her rock during this time.
“I did struggle for the first two and half weeks to even get up out of bed and things like that, and she’d wake up at 3am and help me get to the toilet and just get around, she’s been my biggest support.”
She also thanks the Crows for their support too, and despite her knee injury, the club has rewarded Scheer’s stellar first season by re-signing the forward on a two-year deal.
Also a talented cricket allrounder (Scheer was a state-level junior legspinner and big-hitting batter), she is considering returning to cricket as a circuit-breaker from football.
“I stopped cricket to focus on footy, but I am thinking about going back and playing, maybe playing some club cricket or something.
“I had more joy out of football, but then cricket was a distraction for me. Since I’ve quit, it’s just been football, football, football … I think I’m kind of missing going from footy to cricket and I think that’s when I was playing my best footy.”
But being a part of women’s footy means everything to her.
“I used to play with the boys and had the same pathway as the others that I didn’t expect there to be a women’s AFL, but now that there is, it’s just incredible to play at the top level with the best. it’s great to be a part of.”
And there is silver lining from doing her right knee — her kicking leg; her left-foot kick is becoming a real weapon.
“I’m getting a pro on my left,” she says with something of a glint her eye, and opposition teams should start being nervous about this already.
Particularly given she’s back running.
So, how did it feel to run on her reconstructed knee on Friday?
“It was great,” she says. “Limp free too. It was not very far, but it was a start.”
Chloe Scheer:
Born: 7/10/99
Height: 165cm
Recruited from: North Adelaide/Modbury
Three-time Narelle Smith medallist for best and fairest under-18s in the Adelaide Footy League/SAWFL from 2015-17
Won the 2017 Dutschke Medal as the best and fairest in the senior competition
Starred for SA in the opening round of the 2017 NAB AFLW Under-18 Championships and was selected in the combined Allies team
Despite not playing for the Allies in second round of the under-18 carnival, she was still named in the under-18 All Australian squad for 2017