Brisbane Lions defender Conor McKenna set to chalk up a ton of AFL games
Irishman Conor McKenna has been one of the Brisbane Lions’ most consistent performers this season.
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Conor McKenna is “proud” of his performances since returning to the AFL this year, but the job isn’t finished as he strives to win a premiership with the Brisbane Lions.
The pacy defender parted ways with Essendon at the end of 2020 campaign to return home to Ireland, where he spent two seasons playing Gaelic football for Tyrone.
However, wanting to take care of some unfinished AFL business, McKenna returned to Australia to join the Lions, and has exceeded expectations by playing in all of Brisbane’s 20 matches so far this season.
“I wanted to play as many games as possible – all of them if I could,” said the 27-year-old McKenna, who is set to make his 100th AFL appearance on Saturday when the Lions host Adelaide at the Gabba.
“My first goal was to play round one, get in the team, tick that off the list and then keep building with consistent football, and thankfully now I’ve played every game this season, which is good.
“Coming back I was hoping I would hit (100 games) at some point, whether it was this year or in a couple of years,
“It’s obviously a good achievement … and I’m very proud of what I’ve done.”
However. there’s more to do for McKenna and the third-placed Lions, who remain in serious contention for a top-two berth with three rounds of the regular season remaining.
“At Essendon I only ever played in two finals (matches) and they didn’t go well, so there was a goal to come back here and hopefully go deep into the finals, and it’s looking like that so far,” he said.
“We’re going pretty well. It’s a tight competition this year so it really is up for grabs.
“We’ve got three more games left. We’ll see where we finish on the table and then go from there.”
The Lions were three-point winners over Fremantle in Perth on Sunday.
“We knew it was going to be a battle and was going to go down to the wire … and we got the result in the end,” McKenna said.
Originally published as Brisbane Lions defender Conor McKenna set to chalk up a ton of AFL games
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