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Hawthorn’s Jonathan Simpkin has been rewarded for years of perseverance by becoming the feelgood selection story of Saturday’s AFL grand final.
Simpkin will replace Brendan Whitecross, whose own grand final hopes were destroyed by an anterior cruciate ligament injury for the second straight year when he went down last Friday night.
Fremantle have unsurprisingly kept faith with the 22 players that monstered Sydney in Saturday night’s preliminary final.
Whitecross was among the first to congratulate 25-year-old Simpkin, who will play just the 18th AFL game of his career on Saturday and first in 50 days.
“What a story. @jsimpkin32 well done mate,” Whitecross tweeted.
Simpkin’s selection comes after he was best afield for the Box Hill Hawks in last Sunday’s VFL grand final win.
He now has the chance to play in two premierships six days apart.
That opportunity hasn’t come easily.
First rookie-drafted by Sydney ahead of the 2006 season, Simpkin didn’t play an AFL game in his two years with the Swans before being delisted.
He joined Geelong’s VFL side in 2008, but spent most of that season playing with his home side Colac in the Geelong league.
But he returned to the VFL the following season and was eventually rookie-drafted by the Cats ahead of the 2011 season.
Even then, it took him until mid-2012 to make his AFL debut and after four AFL games with the Cats, including their elimination final loss to Fremantle, he was delisted at the end of last season.
He won Geelong’s VFL best and fairest award for a second straight year.
Picked up by the Hawks as a delisted free agent, Simpkin has played 13 AFL games this season, six as the substitute.
But he wasn’t selected for any of Hawthorn’s previous finals and was not even an emergency for last weekend’s preliminary final against Geelong.
His strong VFL performance on Sunday swung the Hawks’ match committee his way.
“His form throughout the finals with Box Hill has been outstanding and he has really earned his spot in the team,” Hawks head of coaching and development Chris Fagan told the club’s website.
Fremantle’s Luke McPharlin, Chris Mayne and Michael Johnson all trained on Thursday and were declared ready to play in the grand final, after missing the club’s open training session on Tuesday.
Mayne suffered back spasms before the win over Sydney, while Johnson and McPharlin have recently returned from calf injuries.
Simpkin is one of four Hawks set to play in their first grand final.
The others are Brian Lake, Bradley Hill and Max Bailey.
In contrast, Zac Dawson and Danyle Pearce are the only Fremantle players with grand final experience.
Dawson played in three grand finals with St Kilda, for a draw and two losses, while Pearce played in Port Adelaide’s 2007 grand final loss.
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