Ibbotson recalls pain of being dropped
Fremantle’s Garrick Ibbotson has revealed how the pain of watching his team cop a pasting from cross town rival West Coast has motivated him to become a more consistent player under Ross Lyon.
Ibbotson, who will play his 100th AFL game against Melbourne on Saturday, was dropped after Fremantle’s loss to Hawthorn in Launceston this season and sat out the season’s first derby.
Earlier this week teammate David Mundy labelled Ibbotson a player of exceptional physical ability who had occasionally lapsed in his application.
Ibbotson said missing the derby had helped him overcome that trait and he still reminds himself of it now.
“I missed a game earlier in the season,” he said. “Ross said to me he thought I could give more than I was.”
“Once I sat down and watched the derby from the sidelines and had seen how hard it is to watch your teammates play knowing you wanted to be out there contributing was really really tough.”
“It is something I have taken on board and I have used it as motivation to make sure that I am getting 100 per cent all of the time and making sure I am doing all I can to be as good as I can.”
Ibbotson was a late starter in football, playing soccer until he was 14 and only starting Australian Rules football at Bull Creek Leeming as a bit of fun with his mates.
He wasn’t sure he would even be drafted, and then wasn’t sure he would ever really make it.
“It has been a little while,” he said. “I have been at the club seven years now and played my first year in reserves at East Fremantle and then league at East Fremantle and then made it through to the AFL after a lot of hard work.”
“It has taken a little while but it is really good to be here now.”
“I was only 17 when I got drafted and at the time I was only a fifty fifty whether I was going to get drafted at all.”
“It was surprising but exciting at the time just to be on the list and then it has been hard work trying to play regular AFL footy. To be one hundred game sin touch wood is really good.”
The setbacks he has had along the way mean that he never gets entirely comfortable with his position in the big league, he said.
“I am never really one hundred per cent comfortable. It gets a bit easier as you go along. Ross has said that a hundred games is your apprenticeship as an AFL footballer.”
“After I had made about fifty I have played relatively consistently from then. I haven’t had too many injuries either.”
“I never really knew I was going to play one hundred games. I could have a bad injury tomorrow and that could be the end of it.”
“Once I had started playing relatively consistently I was looking forward to making a milestone like that.”
‘I have probably been lucky to be blessed with physical capabilities. I came into the club pretty skinny and relatively quick.”
Despite rampant speculation about what might be possible for the Dockers when they take the field on Saturday with 6th spot on the ladder a possibility, Ibbotson said the team would treat the game against the Demons as a stand alone game and try to repeat their best football.
Ibbotson missed a light training session on Wednesday morning but will play. Matthew Pavlich (groin), Kepler Bradley (head knock) and Matt de Boer (soreness) also missed the session.
Pavlich has not yet been declared a certain starter in the match after missing the team’s win against North Melbourne last weekend with groin soreness.
