The Roar
The Roar

AFL
Advertisement

"Your brother is an absolute disgrace": Families feel the impact of AFL scandals

25th June, 2016
Advertisement
Travis Cloke in his time with the Magpies. (AFL media/Slattery Images).
Roar Guru
25th June, 2016
8
1676 Reads

The media that cover the AFL love a good old-fashioned scandal – always have, probably always will.

It sells newspapers and encapsulates audiences around the nation each night, but it also causes undue stress on the footballers and their families.

Travis Cloke and Dane Swan were two players at the centre of one such scandal when Woman’s Day magazine published nude photos of the footballers.

Travis’ brother Jason, a footballer himself who played 76 games for Collingwood, spoke of the effect these photos had on his family.

“I am a builder and I went to a job site at the start of the year and I had a client tell me when those nude photos came out ‘your brother is an absolute disgrace to your family’.” Cloke told Lace Out Podcast.

“Travis has been told by a lot of lawyers that he should have taken legal action but he’s the sort of bloke that says ‘shit happens’ and moves on.”

Travis Cloke is certainly no stranger to media scrutiny and it is something he has had to deal with his whole life.

But it has increased ten-fold over the past twelve months with the star forward out of form and often languishing in the VFL.

Advertisement

“He is a star player that is out of form, who gets paid good money to kick goals and he has not been doing that to his full potential.

“But there are a lot of guys at other AFL clubs not getting kicks.”

It is not a surprise that Travis Cloke is under the microscope – you get that when you are a marquee player at the biggest club in the land.

But given the mental health issues gripping many footballers these days, perhaps the media should also report the positive stories.

“It is amazing how much negative publicity they put in the papers.

“Travis on his day off goes to the children’s hospital and sits with different kids for an hour, or does this at a school or goes down to my kid’s AusKick.

“You never see any positive things in the paper these days, it’s always about the negatives.”

Advertisement

So where to from here with the football career of Travis Cloke?

He is clearly out of favour with coach Nathan Buckley but at 29 years of age he still has the potential of a couple more good seasons.

There is also a division in opinion on whether his demotion to the reserves has been warranted with many supporters believing he has been made the scapegoat for the Magpies’ poor form as a team.

He has also been playing sore and was unable to feel one side of his body during a game a couple of weeks ago due to receiving an epidural in his spine.

His brother Jason can see the positives in a change of scenery but says that ultimately the ball is in Collingwood’s court.

“Travis is the sort of bloke in that he is quite loyal.

“He got offered a lot of money to go to another club four years ago and didn’t want to go.

Advertisement

“You look at other clubs and players like Jarrod Waite and their careers have blossomed.

“It goes down to what Collingwood wants to do, if they don’t want him then it makes his decision easy.”

close