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Greater Western Sydney’s most important player, Shane Mumford, will miss the rest of the 2015 AFL Season after undergoing ankle surgery.
I must say, this one took me by surprise. The Giants bench resembled a Saturday afternoon physiotherapist’s waiting room by the end of Sunday’s loss to Collingwood, with Mumford, Joel Patfull, Stephen Coniglio and Phil Davis all on the pine with game-ending injuries.
Of all of the injuries, Mumford’s looked the least serious, with a bit of ice strapped to the ankle. Turns out he had ruptured the deltoid ligament, and like those pesky knees, surgery is the only real option.
What is the deltoid ligament? AnatomyExpert.com says it “prevents excessive eversion of the ankle joint”. What is excessive eversion, you ask? Good question. It’s a really complicated way of saying it’s the big ligament in your ankle that allows for side-to-side movement. It sounds quite important for key ruckman skills like running, jumping and turning. Mummy needs his deltoid ligament to be in ship shape.
Medical lessons aside, what does this mean for Greater Western Sydney’s season?
Quite obviously, the Giants will be forced to turn to one of three other ruckmen on their list: Rory Lobb (two games), Tom Downie (one game) or Andrew Phillips (11 games). To say that this will be a significant positional downgrade is a bit of an understatement.
Shane Mumford has been massive for the Giants this year, being third in hit outs per game (38.5), in addition to providing three clearances and a contested mark per game for the Giants. But it’s his impact around those clearance situations that will be missed the most: Mumford is currently leading the Giants in tackles with almost 6.5 per game.
He’s become the enforcer, and it’s crystal clear when you watch the Giants play that Big Mummy gives those emerging midfielders around him an added sense of swagger. He’s like the bodyguard for a boy band.
All of a sudden, Giants fans will be thanking their stars that their team has already pulled together seven wins at the halfway point. This had put them in a solid position to make the eight – some were even talking top four. And you know what? It’s not beyond reach, even without Mumford.
The Giants still have engagements with Gold Coast, Essendon, Carlton and Melbourne on their slate. On current form, and with their respective ruck sets in mind, you would still bank those four as wins. That gets them to 11-4, with seven games remaining. That’s where it gets a little more complicated.
Their remaining seven include away dates with Richmond, Geelong, Fremantle and Port Adelaide; with home stands against St Kilda, Sydney and this week’s match up with North Melbourne. Do they get two of those? That may be enough, particularly in this season’s middle class logjam.
But it may not be, and the loss of Mumford adds that additional layer of complexity that no side wants to entertain at the halfway mark of the AFL season.