AFL grand final 2024: Inside the world of Brisbane forward Joe Daniher ahead of the Lions quest for a premiership
In Grand Final week, Joe Daniher didn’t let anything slip that it would be his last game. Instead, he spoke to CALLUM DICK about not owning a TV, loving coffee, and what makes him tick.
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Brisbane Lions superstar Joe Daniher is ready to set the record straight.
The AFL’s pre-eminent man of mystery allegedly keeps “a coffee machine in the back of his car” and “drinks seven coffees a day” according to teammate Dayne Zorko.
“That is false. That is definitely false,” he laughs, speaking the week before the Grand Final.
“I do enjoy a coffee. I’m up early and on the road early so I probably do have a few too many coffees a day, but I don’t have (a coffee machine) in the car, unfortunately. I might have to look into it though.”
In the same viral social media clip, his forward line partner in crime, Cam Rayner, swore hand on heart that Daniher “loves his animated movies … doesn’t have a TV, but watches them on his iPad and comes back and reports on all of them.
“It is why his song is ‘Let it Go’ at the Gabba.”
“I think that’s a bit of a fib too,” he says with a grin.
“There’s a little bit of mayo coming from those guys. I don’t spend too much time on (the iPad).”
With that, the enigmatic Daniher is now slightly less-so.
But do we really want to learn all there is to know about Smokin’ Joe?
Brisbane’s talismanic key forward is one of the AFL’s great showmen. He can sometimes make the simple appear difficult and often the impossible a sure thing.
In Sydney it was Lance Franklin and in Melbourne it was Dustin Martin. In Brisbane, Joe Daniher is the man who puts bums on seats.
If Zorko and Rayner’s tongue-in-cheek responses were said of anyone else, their lies would have been sleuthed immediately. That the world could not agree on whether this was fact or fiction spoke volumes.
His mystery is all part of the appeal – and we secretly love it.
Why does he play for a Brisbane club but live in Northern New South Wales? Why does he not own a TV? Why does he refuse to run through the banner on game day? Why is his goal celebration song ‘Let it Go’ from the animated movie Frozen?
Like a magician who finally reveals his tricks, if Daniher were to bare all the football world would likely lose interest.
What we do know is he looms as the Lions’ grand final matchwinner. The man who, with a wave of his magical left boot, could end the club’s 21-year premiership drought.
It is for exactly this occasion that Chris Fagan sought to lure Daniher out of Essendon in 2020.
The 200cm spearhead’s move from Windy Hill to Springfield has by now been well documented.
Fagan, the father figure who a year earlier convinced Lachie Neale to leave Fremantle and a year before that Charlie Cameron to come home from Adelaide, dialled into Daniher’s Gold Coast hotel room during the Covid-impacted 2020 season and pitched his case.
The rest as they say is history.
After a frustrating run of injuries at Essendon – the club he was born to play for as a member of the AFL’s royal family – he has completely revitalised his career at the Lions.
Brisbane’s fitness staff have long been lauded for their role in his revival, and they deserve plenty of credit.
But his father, Anthony Daniher, has another theory.
“I haven’t asked him this personally, but I know he swims at the beach every day and I tend to think, ‘Why do the Swans have such a good run with rehab and health?’ Well it’s probably because they’re in that salt water every day that he’s in,” Anthony tells this masthead.
“It’s good for the mind, good for the soul and good for the body. Where he lives he’s two minutes from the beach. I think that may have been in his thought process (when he moved from Melbourne) and if it was, it’s worked brilliantly.
“If he stays on the paddock that’s half the battle. You have to keep yourself fit and healthy, both physically and mentally, and living where he does at Ocean Shores has helped make it happen which is fantastic.”
Perhaps it was with those same beaches in mind that Daniher first requested a trade out of Essendon in 2019 – to the Swans, not the Lions.
History will show that Essendon and Sydney failed to strike a deal that year and Daniher remained for another frustrating four-game season in 2020, before finally getting his move north, to Brisbane.
In another world, he would be lining up in the red and white on Saturday. Oh how the Swans would love to have him as the focal point of their attack, instead of scheming against him.
Anthony is happy to admit he would have loved to see his son at the Swans, too. After all, he did play for South Melbourne/Sydney 115 times from 1981-86, before moving to Essendon where he played another 118 games.
It would have been a fitting father-son football fairytale.
“That didn’t eventuate and that’s OK,” he says.
“That would have been quite special had it have been the Swans, but it’s a tricky game trying to move clubs. Never easy.”
The Danihers are NSW’s first family of football.
Anthony’s brother, Terry, first played for South Melbourne before moving to Essendon. Anthony would join the Bloods three years after Terry left and later reunite with him at the Bombers in 1987.
As a family, the Danihers have played more V/AFL games than any other. Earlier this year, Joe became the third Daniher to reach 200 games – fourth if you count his inspirational uncle Neale’s 223-game coaching career at Melbourne, which followed 82 as a player at Essendon.
“There’s obviously some family ties to that football club,” Joe Daniher says.
“I know my family is very thankful for what the club did for them, but I’m hoping all the family will be on the Brisbane Lions this weekend.”
Having watched his son’s career blossom in Brisbane, Anthony says the move was undoubtedly the correct call.
“Just a fantastic organisation. Any club has to be solid at the top and (Lions president) Andrew Wellington and (CEO) Greg Swann are fantastic, strong characters who get footy.
“The support Fages has had with (football boss) Danny Daly and (former football boss) David Noble, they’ve just had good people in the right positions to be able to attract good players.
“It says a lot about the program, the people and the culture.
“Joe has played footy now for a long time and all of it hasn’t been roses. There’s been some really tough periods and I think going north allowed him to approach it in a different way, especially where he wanted to live and how he wanted to go about it.”
Despite his close ties with the Swans, Anthony will watch from the MCG stands on Saturday with a Lions scarf draped around his neck, as will the bulk of the Daniher clan.
“You move on and evolve. Blood is thicker than water,” he says.
“But I still have a loving spot for the Swannies. They’re a super club, full of super people. Let’s just hope it’s a cracker game and the right team wins.
“There will be a lot of Danihers there. They loved their footy and they love Joey, so there will be a lot of us around.”
Anthony has steered a smaller but still passionate Daniher contingent around the country, following the Lions’ incredible finals run.
He had front row seats for his son’s two clutch goals that completed a remarkable 44-point comeback in the semi-final win over GWS.
“That was a great trip to Engie Stadium. We had my mum there, sisters, grandchildren … to get over the line was pretty awesome.
“That was pretty special for him to get those two (goals) through the big sticks. Fantastic. Good under pressure.”
It was in that moment, when Daniher produced the impossible goal from the pocket that perhaps only he could have kicked, that the football world got another small glimpse into his psyche.
The normally unflappable forward let out a roar of emotion and sought out his teammates to celebrate the moment, before urging them to keep going.
A minute later, he out-marked arguably the best one-on-one defender in the competition and kicked truly once again to send the Lions into the prelim.
“At different times the game requires different levels of emotion and that can fluctuate for me depending on the game and the period of time, but obviously it was a super win to be a part of – an amazing game of footy,” says Daniher.
“Even the month leading into the finals series we’ve had a collective group of guys that have all had really important moments that gave us a chance to be where we are now.”
Where they are now is a rare chance at redemption.
After the heartbreak of last year’s four-point grand final defeat to Collingwood, in which Daniher was among the best on ground, he and his teammates have a second chance on Saturday.
Reflecting on the road to his second grand final, Daniher says the club is now absolutely his home away from home.
“The funny thing about it is you can see the relationship of the group in the way we play and how we look after each other on the field. I think that’s a fair indication of how we are off the field, too.
“It’s a very close group. It’s a great environment to be a part of and the guys really just enjoy each other’s company.
“I think everyone was happy to come down a day earlier this year because it means that everyone is in each other’s pockets for another day and the guys are just enjoying that.”
Originally published as AFL grand final 2024: Inside the world of Brisbane forward Joe Daniher ahead of the Lions quest for a premiership
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