Easton Wood on his failed forward move

Easton Wood on his failed forward move

It’s 3am at The Ice Hotel in Sweden’s far north.

It’s quiet and freezing cold, but Easton Wood is awake. The Western Bulldogs captain is gazing at the Northern Lights in the sky above.

For a man who admits he can be an “over thinker” this is a rare moment of reflection.

“The aurora is like a massive curtain that just shimmers across the sky. It grows and shrinks like it’s alive,” Wood said.

“That hotel was an unbelievable experience, but it was worst night’s sleep I’ve ever had. It was -5C in the room.”

Safe to say, Wood isn’t your Bali, Potato Head Beach Club, variety of footballer.

The defender, 29, last weekend celebrated his wedding to girlfriend Tiffany on the Mornington Peninsula. The pair are what some friends term “professional travellers”.

They’ve done Madagascar, Jordan, Turkey, Cuba, Mexico, Chile, Brazil, the USA and Canada. This off-season they rode horses on Iceland’s black beaches, wore mud masks in a geothermal lagoon and travelled to the far north of Scandinavia.

“Every time we’re travelling, every trip we’re on, we plan the next trip,” Wood says.

Wood did some travelling on the field last year, too.

A man not afraid to take himself out of his comfort zone in the off-season, he found himself doing the same in-season when he packed his bags and moved to the forward line.

Despite all the planning and preparation, the attacking 50m wasn’t exactly an exotic destination.

“It obviously didn’t go well,” Wood said with a rueful chuckle.

“I was actually really looking forward to the opportunity. Ten years into my career having only played as a defender, I was like, ‘I feel like I’ve learned a couple of little things from the best forwards I’ve played on’.

“I thought I was going to have a good impact down there and be able to make something of it but that didn’t transpire and it was hard.

“I obviously returned to playing back very quickly and I certainly got an appreciation for how difficult it can be down there.”

Another thing he got an appreciation for - not that Wood really needed it - was being out there, more hamstring problems cost the intercept specialist 10 games in a season where the Dogs struggled to get their heads above water on the injury front.

But while it would have been easy for the skipper to write the season off after going down in Round 13, he was fiercely determined to get back for the last two games of the Dogs’ season.

“That was super important, mainly for my mental state coming into this pre-season,” Wood said.

“If I had not played those two games I wouldn’t have known or proved to myself that I was fit and it would have been another two and a half months before I could really test it out so it was good to get it out of the way.”

In his absence there were well-documented struggles. The Dogs slumped to 5-13 before a late-season revival that saw them win three in a row before a final-round three-point loss to Richmond.

But it wasn’t all doom and gloom. Premiership players Lachie Hunter, Jack Macrae and Toby McLean got better, while defender Aaron Naughton was a first-year revelation and fellow teenager Ed Richards showed flashes of brilliance.

Wood said his club had gone through “such a huge amount of change” that comparisons to, or discussion around, the 2016 premiership were impossible.

“We’ve got this surfboard up on the wall in the meeting room from the first time we went to Mooloolaba for pre-season camp and it’s got the team photo printed on there,” he said.

“But looking at it, there’s only 17 people still here from that photo. That was a shock.

“You look at our age demographic now and what I’m so excited about is that because we’re so young … most of the boys are an open book and they’re ready to learn.

“It’s not a case of the older guys saying, ‘Well, you’re trying to do this, but I’ve always done it this way so I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing’.”

That rapid list turnover in the two years since that glorious premiership included the October departures of Luke Dahlhaus, Marcus Adams and Jordan Roughead.

Asked how he felt when he learnt Dahlhaus wanted out, Wood said: “We’re obviously disappointed to lose someone like that, who has been here such a long time and been such a wonderful teammate.

“The way he attacked the ball, it was evident how much effort he put in so it’s always disappointing … also because of the bond of playing in the flag together.”

And the contracted Adams?

“It was a surprise, but he had his reasons and some guys need fresh starts. You hope that it has the impact they’re after,” he said.

“It’s the nature of the game these days, player movement and freedom is a good thing, but the reality is you’re going to lose people at some point.

“Things move so quickly in these places that you just can’t dwell.”

Wood acknowledged AFL pre-seasons were full of positive cliches and superficial hype - “all that bulls--t” - but the fact is the Dogs have enjoyed a much-needed good run on the injury front.

Liam Picken (concussion), Lukas Webb (neck) and Tom Boyd (back) have been the only long-term absentees in a pre-season that’s seen record numbers hit the track.

“It’s the most we’ve ever had,” Wood said.

“There were only a couple who had operations at season’s end, which is less than normal

“It’s been a surprise during match play because often we’re playing 15 versus 15 given that’s all we had. But we’ve had guys on the bench this summer so it’s been great.

“That youth, a lack of experience presents challenges, but it also brings with it a wonderful opportunity.”

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Originally Posted by GVGjr

“But looking at it, there’s only 17 people still here from that photo. That was a shock.

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The turnover is amazing at any club - let alone on that managed to win a flag in the middle of it all.

Really appreciated this article...looking forwards to Round 1.

Nice article. Would've been good to hear why he thought it went wrong up front though...