- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
Geelong coach Mark Thompson concedes the AFL premiers may have to trade as they deal with increasing salary cap pressures.
Thompson is determined that Saturday’s epic 12-point grand final win over minor premiers St Kilda will not be the end of an era.
A few days ago, Cats forward Cameron Mooney admitted their third-successive grand final could be the last chance for this team, which also won the 2007 premiership.
But Thompson will go into next month’s trade period with the mindset of sustaining their status as the league’s pacesetters.
“What I’m looking forward to is getting into the draft this year,” Thompson said.
“We’ve got some salary cap problems, we might have to trade. But I’m looking forward to getting the best group of kids we possibly can.
“I’m excited about that and training them up and putting pressure on guys and having the best football club in Australia – that’s all I’m interested in.
“It’s great the little city 80km from Melbourne can achieve what they achieve.”
One near-certain change to the team is the retirement of captain Tom Harley, while defender Darren Milburn, who is 32, is set to continue.
Harley said the club’s hierarchy had made it clear that their premiership players would not be forced into retirement.
“I met with Bomber (Thompson) and Cooky (chief executive Brian Cook) and Balmey (football manager Neil Balme) about halfway through the year, myself and Darren Milburn and they said ‘it’s totally in your hands. If you want to play on you can play, if not we’d understand that’,” Harley said.
“Our culture gets spoken about a lot and the fact that they want premiership players to be forever welcome at the club … they’re not going to show any of us the door.
“I’m part of that group obviously so they’ll leave that decision up to me.”
Thompson also confirmed at his post-match media conference that he would leave the final decision with his skipper.
Two flags in three years cements this team’s status as an all-time great group, but Thompson is unconcerned.
“You’ll say whatever you want to say – in the end, we’ll enjoy this victory … and then get back on the horse and try to be the best we can be again next year,” he said.
“I love the fact how your club just evolves. Some people fall off and retire because of age, we’ll have a couple of them, maybe.”
Thompson said he was confident before and during the match that the Cats would win, despite periods during the game where the Saints were dominating.
“Maybe because we’ve had a lot of close games this year, but I just felt we were going to win,” he said.
“Deep down, walking into the ground, I just felt we were going to win.
“At halftime I thought we were going to win, at three-quarter time I even thought we were going to win – I’m not sure if I was being stupid or not.”
Thompson said in Friday’s pre-game media conference that the pain of last year’s upset grand final loss to Hawthorn would be a spur for his players.
He had no doubt that motivation was a factor in a game where the biggest margin was just 12 points.
“It’s hard to watch, it’s hard to cop and if you get another chance to be in one as recently as we did, one year, I don’t think if you looked back in history there would be too many teams that did lose the second one in a row,” he said.
Who’s in your ultimate team? Pick the best team and compete with other fans for daily prizes on Draftstars. For the best odds on the game try out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Think. Is this a bet you really want to place? Set a deposit limit.