AFL 2024: Peter Wright ready to lead Essendon forward line into a pressure-packed season

Three days before round 1 last year, Peter Wright went down with a shoulder injury. Now, back to full fitness, he’s set to lead a new Essendon forward line that is hoping to rise to the expectation.

Peter Wright is set to lead the Bombers’ forward line in 2024. Picture: Michael Klein.

At first, Peter Wright told himself it would be fine.

Just 72 hours from Essendon’s first game of last season, Wright’s shoulder popped out of its socket.

Months after winning the Bombers best-and-fairest, the giant forward was ready to go to another level in 2023 under new coach Brad Scott.

Instead, he never really got going.

This week Wright knocked on wood before the final main training of the pre-season, as he got ready to step back into a forward line that would look drastically different to last year in a club that has had as many questions swirling around it as any heading into 2024.

“It was out of the socket for a little while,” Wright said, recalling the shoulder injury last March.

“I guess a lot of thoughts go through your head and when it goes back in, you get full range of movement and I thought ‘it feels OK here’, just in my naivety.

Peter Wright has bounced back after a tough 2023. Picture: Brendan Beckett

“And then it was about 20 minutes later that all the blood rushes to it and I couldn’t move it after that and reality hits that it could be season over at that point.”

Thanks to a chipped bone and torn cartilage in the shoulder, Wright was first told he could miss up to 20 weeks, but returned by round 13 to play the final 10 games of the season and kick 19 goals.

“It was incredibly challenging … it was definitely disappointing through a challenging period and I felt like I was able to work my way back through my rehab to be able to play a good brand of footy,” he said.

He admitted there was “a bit of lag time” on his return last year and the spearhead didn’t properly find form as the Dons steadily fell out of the finals race.

By then, Kyle Langford had established himself as the new Essendon key target, on his way to a 51-goal season.

Harry Jones is back in the Essendon mix. Picture: Michael Willson/AFL Photos

Wright had partnered well with Harry Jones in the back end of 2022, but the pair didn’t play a game together last year.

Jade Gresham was playing for St Kilda, too, before moving to Essendon as a free agent.

It promises to be a shake up for a team that finished 13th in the competition for scoring and kicked just eight goals combined in the final fortnight of the year.

“I think over the pre-season we have been constantly learning about how each other play, there is a little bit of a different forward mix,” Wright said.

“I have played with Harry previously and he has had a couple of good years for us and played some good footy. I only had 10 weeks playing with Kyle at the back-end of last year.

“We feel like that synergy is something we are still working on. No forward group is going to walk into round 1 and be the finished product.”

On paper at least, Essendon’s forward group should stroll into round 1 with a personnel advantage, as Hawthorn scrambles to build a defence around James Sicily after injuries to key backs James Blanck (knee), Denver Grainger-Barras (toe) and youngster Will McCabe (back).

Wright bagged six goals the last time he played against the Hawks, in 2022, but he backed away from any talk of dominating an undermanned opposition defence.

“You are not oblivious to things like that, I watch football but don’t listen to a lot of football commentary around it,” he said.

“You never like to see injuries in football really and they had a couple of big ones go down. What I have seen in football is it is a lot to do with their defensive strategies behind the football and how teams set up.

“Just because one player is out, it doesn’t mean you are automatically going to have a field day. When you have that mindset is when it never works out for you. It will be all about how we work together as a front six and how we are able to implement our system on game day.”

DEFENCE AND EXPECTATION

Brad Scott is promising a steady built. Picture: Michael Willson/AFL Photos

While Essendon’s forward line may take time to click this season, it is in defence where the Bombers will really need to fly up.

Coach Scott told this masthead recently that “Essendon sides over time have been pretty good at attacking, not so good at defending”.

The Bombers have not finished in the top eight best defences in any year since 2014 – when Mark Thompson was stepping in as coach for James Hird.

In that same time period, the Dons have ranked in the top eight for scoring just twice – 2021 and 2017.

Defensive-minded midfielder Will Setterfield said becoming stingier has been “hammered” since Scott arrived last pre-season but he didn’t buy into the club necessarily having an offensive-minded culture.

“It’s certainly something that Scotty is driving with the players: that defensive intent,” he said.

“I certainly think a team can play a more offensive style, the way they have been coached to play with more flow on the ball and take the game on but it can more just to be to do with the numbers.”

Few teams have as much outside noise about expectation and performance than Essendon this summer, as fans crave a step out of the treadmill of mediocre performances that have defined the club in the past two decades.

Scott has promised to build steadily – even mentioning an eight-year plan – despite the club landing recruits Ben McKay, Todd Goldstein, Xavier Duursma and Gresham in the off-season.

Ben McKay has come into the Bombers’ line-up to help stem the flow of goals which Essendon has been conceding for a decade. Picture: Michael Willson/AFL Photos via Getty Images.

Champion goalkicker Matthew Lloyd has been beating the drum all summer that the Dons should aim higher than the middle of the ladder.

And while Wright is open to a surprise rapid rise, he isn’t considering the long-term.

“We definitely have that belief that we have made a lot of steps forward as a group and are excited for the year ahead but having said that, 17 other teams are saying the same thing,” he said.

“Everyone believes they can play finals and I guess we have seen how tight the competition is and that in the last few years it can be a couple of key moments that can change the whole season for you.

“If we go in to (Saturday) thinking long-term view or anything, we are going to quickly find out how hard footy is.”