Geelong Irish defender Oisin Mullin a silver lining of Cats’ frustrating fortnight after shutting down Charlie Cameron
Many Cats fans wouldn’t recognise this player if he walked past them on the street. But he has been a shining light over a tough couple of weeks for the club. And another big job looms.
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It has been a fortnight of frustration for Geelong.
An upset loss to St Kilda after a horror first half and blowing a 32-point lead against reigning premiers Brisbane leaves the Cats on the back foot three rounds into the season with a difficult run to come.
But there is a small, 180 centimetre silver lining to those losses: they may have found their new defensive stopper, another outside the box pick-up from Geelong’s recruiting team, along with a key defender of the future.
Most Cats fans wouldn’t recognise ex-Gaelic football sensation Oisin Mullin if he walked past them on Pakington Street, but the 25-year-old managed to shut down one of the most dangerous small forwards in the competition in Charlie Cameron on Saturday night.
First round pick Connor O’Sullivan has stolen the attention over the past two weeks after earning the round two Rising Star nomination, but Mullin has received little fanfare since touching down in Australia as a Category B rookie ahead of the 2023 season.
The Brisbane faithful only got to hear John Denver’s, ‘Take me Home, Country Roads’, once on Saturday night as Mullin restricted the Lions livewire to just four touches and a goal in 83 minutes, also spending time on Kai Lohmann before he was subbed out of the game.
Cameron was coming back from injury, but it was just Mullin’s 38th game of Aussie rules football – 21 of those coming at AFL level – since the Category B rookie signing touched down in Australia at the end of 2022 from Mayo in the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA).
“He is a pretty good player with a pretty good resume. It was a good experience to get out there and play against someone like Charlie,” Mullin told this masthead.
“I felt it was pretty good learnings and nice confidence builder going into the next game of the season.
“I feel like it’s probably one of my most impactful games so far in my career. Just trying to play a bit freer and relax and not overthink things too much, so I just really enjoyed the game and just tried to remain as relaxed as possible.
“I guess the last couple of weeks I’ve been struggling to find the footy a little bit, but I wasn’t really overthinking it.
“I feel like sometimes if you try and force it, you can have more of a negative impact. So just trying to keep doing the simple things, just keep working through things with the coaches and the players around me and just trying and keep building every week.”
The athletic Irishman didn’t register a kick in his previous game but kept St Kilda playmaker Brad Hill to six touches in 60 minutes and goalsneak Jack Higgins to just the three possessions in 36 minutes.
Emerging Docker Murphy Reid is the only player to get a hold of him so far in 2025, kicking two goals in 22 minutes as part of his majestic four majors in six minutes on AFL debut.
Mullin had an impact going the other way against the Lions with an equal-career-high 15 disposals, six marks and four intercepts.
He had been on the fringes last year with 10 AFL appearances, but his promising performance against the Lions boosted his stocks as he looks to cement a spot in Geelong’s back six — same goes with O’Sullivan.
As Mullin made the transition from Gaelic football in his first two seasons, the career of Irish VFL/AFL games record holder Zach Tuohy was coming to a close.
Mullin is thankful that he had Tuohy there to show him the ropes – and the premiership Cat is still providing words of encouragement.
“Zach was of massive importance over the first two years, through basic fundamentals of kicking and handpassing and touch work at the start, to sitting down and working through edits and stuff and just talking through his own general experiences throughout his footy career,” Mullin said.
“He had a massive impact on me and he was in touch after the game and stuff like that as well, so I will definitely try and seek more contact throughout the year and feedback and work through things with him potentially as well.
“But those first two years I was very lucky to have him around the place.”
Mullin’s hair isn’t growing as long as it once was, but his on-field growth has continued since Tuohy’s retirement at the end of last season, but he is still learning on the job in his third season playing Aussie rules.
“Every day is new learning – be it on field or off field, around skills and just footy knowledge,” Mullin said.
“There’s so much to learn every day, it’s a complicated game at times but it’s simple when you break it down as well at the same time.
“So just working with different players and coaches trying to soak in as much as I can from each session and game.”
He will learn plenty more on Friday night if he saddles up to Melbourne forward Kysaiah Pickett in the exciting Demon’s first back from suspension.
It would be a baptism of fire, but Mullin certainly has the closing speed to match.
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Originally published as Geelong Irish defender Oisin Mullin a silver lining of Cats’ frustrating fortnight after shutting down Charlie Cameron
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