Patrick Dangerfield opens up on suspension and Joel Selwood’s powers of recovery

PATRICK Dangerfield knows first-hand Joel Selwood’s incredible powers of recovery. That’s why has no doubt the Cats’ captain will be on the field for Geelong’s finals campaign.

Patrick Dangerfield at Geelong training.

FOUR years. That’s how long it had been since I had to watch my team from the stands.

Let me tell you, the old saying “it’s easy from up here” doesn’t apply to an AFL coaches box.

Footy is a pretty simple game at times and there’s only so much coaches can do. That part is tough. It would be very difficult being a coach and while I assume you get used to the idea the longer you’re retired, you obviously can’t influence the game anywhere near like you did as a player.

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I served my one-match suspension beside our coaching team for the game against Sydney.

I’d planned to keep my mouth shut, but the good thing about our coaches is they’re always willing to ask for opinion.

Matthew Knights is our midfield coach and we always have open dialogue anyway during a game, but I’m normally on the bench having a rest when it happens. This time I was beside him as we discussed midfield setups and stoppages.

Patrick Dangerfield missed one week through suspension.

Every game you’ve either got momentum and trying to keep it or the opposition has got it and you’re trying to arrest it.

Even though the result didn’t go our way, I must admit, it was a very calm box. There was never a stage of panic, even in that hectic first quarter.

It’s more a calculated, methodical approach like, ‘right, things aren’t going our way, how do we fix it?’

You’re helpless, but it’s pretty interesting trying to change the dynamics or player positioning to try and get a result when you can’t walk out on the field. Obviously that’s what coaching is. It’s not fun, but you get an appreciation of seeing what your coaches really want out of you and it can sometimes be hard to articulate.

When you see it from up top and you’re listening to what they’re trying to achieve and how quickly they’re trying to move things, sometimes it doesn’t happen on the field as quickly as we’d like it to.

That can be hard to understand when you’re only seeing it from one perspective — the players’ perspective.

It was a really weird scenario to be in for someone who hasn’t missed too many games.

That’s because everything we do during a season seems to be building up to something, whether it be main training or a game or whatever. Suddenly when there’s no game the structure in your week is gone.

Patrick Dangerfield struggled sitting out Geelong’s clash against Sydney.

We’re creatures of habit and we’re spoonfed a program to a certain extent. You’re told when to rock up, train here, recover here, play here. That was all thrown out the window for me last week.

Having said that, the worst thing about missing games is you probably train harder aerobically than the guys who are actually playing.

They’re really trying to replicate the exertion your lungs would go through. For me it was working on the bike and keeping off feet, so Chris Dennis smashed me in the gym and Adam Saw smashed me on the bike.

Brian Cook says Selwood getting back for the first final will be "difficult" and "a challenge". Nice honesty. Clearly 5 weeks is optimistic

— Jon Ralph (@RalphyHeraldSun) August 12, 2017

It was good to spend a bit more time with the young fella, which was a silver lining. Although Friday morning was bizarre not thinking about the game.

Unfortunately the loss to the Swans was compounded by the suspensions of Tom Hawkins and Mitch Duncan and the injury to our captain, Joel Selwood.

We’re not going to hang Tom and Mitch out to dry. These things happen in footy, it’s a high pressure game and sometimes you do things you wish you could take back.

Tom Hawkins and Mitch Duncan are suspended for Geelong’s clash against Richmond.

High pressure sport is about being able to absorb that pressure and make the right decisions and both our guys are disappointed. They would much rather be playing. Hawk knows what he has to work on and it’s the same for Mitch.

They’re in the same position I was. But now that it’s done we get over it.

What does it mean this week? Someone else gets a chance and while we’d rather have Hawk play every single week, we’re now less predictable going forward. If we’re going to be a good side, and I believe we are, it shouldn’t matter who is out there. If you pull on our jumper you’re expected to play our way.

I’ve noticed a few raised eyebrows over Selwood’s aim to overcome his syndesmosis injury before the finals.

Let me tell you something about Joel. When I first got here in late 2015 I thought he was stuffed. He could barely move. He’d suffered another setback with his foot and he wasn’t going to be able to run until well after Christmas.

Joel Selwood is helped from the field after injuring his ankle.

I asked him where he was at and he said ‘I’ve sat down with the medicos and we’ll put forward a plan. I’ll play the VFL game before Round 1, I’ll do the main training session before that and then the main session before Round 1’.

He said that, no word of a lie, in late November. The start of the season was five month away and yet he reached every goal, ticked every box and was ready to go for that season-opener against Hawthorn where he had 23 touches and seven clearances.

You hear people say there’s certain injuries people just don’t get back from, but I will never, ever doubt his powers of recovery because he’s called it before and he was spot on.

From what I hear the surgery was successful. Now the challenge for us is to get ourselves into as good a position as possible for when he returns.

Can he do it? I’ve got no doubt he can.