If he gets through the next 6 games, it takes him to 250 games. Another huge achievement for him, and for our rich history of rookies playing huge amounts of games.
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He was on AFL game day this morning. If anyone missed it he strongly hinted that he is more than happy to keep on playing next year so long as the body holds up. That's good enough for me. Sign him up I say.
In comparison to Bob last year on deciding whether to go on, Bob was resigned in his mind that another preseason was too much whereas Moz would play 10 more years if he could.
HEART AND SOUL BULLDOG WANTS TO PLAY ON
By Sam Landsberger
WESTERN Bulldogs warrior Dale Morris has confirmed he wants to play on next season at the age of 36.
The Herald Sun revealed last month that the door was open for Morris to play on in 2019 as he returned from a partially torn ACL in just 100 days.
Morris, 35, yesterday said he had not considered retirement.
“I’ll keep going for as long as I can,” Morris said.
“As long as the body holds up and the mind … and so long as there’s a role for me, I’ll be there.”
The bionic Bulldog and premiership star returned from knee surgery after 11 days last week and Morris is on track to celebrate his 250th match in Round 21 against North Melbourne.
Coach Luke Beveridge said the return of hard men Morris and Marcus Adams had “made a huge difference” in the past two weeks.
“We haven’t had access to Picko (Liam Picken), to Clay (Smith), to Libba (Tom Liberatore), to Moz (Dale Morris) — the four combative, contested-type strong players that teammates feed off,” Beveridge said.
Morris is the third-oldest player on an AFL list, behind hamstrung Hawthorn champion Shaun Burgoyne (36 in October) and Fremantle ruckman Aaron Sandilands (36 in December).
“I love the game too much. I just love playing, it’s the greatest job ever I reckon,” Morris said on Channel 7.
Mitch Wallis yesterday joined fellow free agent Luke Dahlhaus in declaring he wants to stay at Whitten Oval next year.
Beveridge has publicly challenged his free agents to “play out of their skin” in order to command healthy contracts.
Dahlhaus — who is chasing a four or five-year contract — played his best game for the season on Friday night as a defensive forward on Geelong’s Zach Tuohy.
Beveridge said it was “a really, really big night” for Dahlhaus.
As noted earlier in the thread, I'm heavily in the "yes" camp for Morris playing on. The fire still clearly burns and there is probably no player in the competition who does more to get themselves right for gameday.
You can't overstate just how important Morris is as a leader and how important he is in defense. I'd love to transition him into a playing assistant coach role as he has so much that he can teach kids.
Will be a huge turnout for his 250th game I would imagine. Was great to see Bob in his 300th game - wish Bob played in the premiership but such a great touch to let him hold the cup on GF day at the G and at WO the next day. Some images will never forget. I have the Hearld Suk papers from those PF and GF weekends.
Watch Moz on CH7 Game day here
Given that we really didn't really try and address key position defenders during the draft or trade periods and also losing Adams and delisting Collinsin the process I can see that we will be asking Morris to play tall for much of next season. Not only do we need him around the younger players from a leadership perspective but he will certaintly be required to man up against some of the competitions bigger names.
The likes of Khamis, Vandermeer and both Lewis and Lachlan Young will all benefit by having Moz around the club