62 SNFOOTBALL SHEPPARTON NEWS, FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2015

Elite growth Oliver’s twistHOW HALF A SEASON OF FOOTBALL TURNED BUSHRANGER’S ATTENTION FROM RADIOGRAPHY TO AFL

AFL dreams will be realisedand shattered at Tuesday’sNational Draft. Teenagerssuch as likely No. 1 pickJacob Weitering have beendestined for AFL stardomtheir entire junior careers.Then there are draft bolterssuch as Murray BushrangerClayton Oliver. News sportsjournalist Georgina Cahillmet Mooroopna productOliver this week to talkabout his emergence fromdraft unknown to likelyfirst round pick.

Bolter: Murray Bushranger Clayton Oliver’s stunning second half of the TAC Cup season has madehim a likely first round pick in Tuesday’s AFL National Draft. Picture: Ray Sizer

Learning curve: Clayton Oliver, pictured hugging Mooroopnateammate Luke Conca after defeating Shepparton United tomake last year’s finals, said playing senior GVFL football helpedhis development more than the three TAC Cup games he playedas 23rd man for the struggling Bendigo Pioneers.

Stormed home: Clayton Oliver polled 14 votes in the final sevenTAC Cup rounds to win this year’s Morrish Medal. The midfielderalso won the John Byrne Medal as the Murray Bushrangers’ best-and-fairest.

I WANTED TO BE A RADIOGRAPHER AT THE START OF THE YEAR,

THAT’S WHY I DID METHODS AND CHEMISTRY. . . THEN FOOTY

SORT OF TOOK OVER. — CLAYTON OLIVER

An unexpected phone callin the school toilets madeClayton Oliver realise hisdream of playing elite foot-ball was within reach.

Oliver came from nowherethis TAC Cup season tobecome a highly rated top10 pick ahead of Tuesday’sAFL National Draft.

The Murray Bushrangersinside midfielder admits hisjourney has been and still isa crazy one.

‘‘(Bushies talent manager)Lee Fraser called me atschool one day, I was in thetoilets and he’s told me thatI got a got a letter to the Nat-ional Combine,’’ he said.

‘‘I didn’t really know whatthat meant, to be honest.

‘‘I told (schoolmate andhighly rated draft prospectJosh) Schache I was going tothe National Combine andhe’s like ‘That’s awesome,you must have about five(AFL) clubs interested inyou’ and I was like ‘oh s***’.

‘‘A couple of days later, Iwas heading down to Rich-mond to play in the VFL andI started talking to the AFLrecruiters.

‘‘They were talking to meabout it and I’m like ‘geez, Imight get picked up here’.

‘‘I still thought it was a bitof a long shot, it was adream at that stage. I startedplaying better footy and afew more clubs started talk-ing to me.’’

Oliver, 18, finished theTAC Cup season with Mor-rish and John Byrne medals,as well as selection, on theinterchange, in the Team ofthe Year.

He performed well at lastmonth’s combine, impress-ing with his agility and goal-kicking.

However, he had a lot ofwork to do in the lead-up tothe testing, conceding hisfitness quickly dropped offafter the Bushies exitedfinals in straight sets.

‘‘After the season finished,I was a little bit fat and alittle bit unfit,’’ he said.

‘‘I was over on the (Moor-oopna) netball courts, (Bu-shies high performancemanager) Matt Glossopcame over and we weredoing my skinfolds and theywere like 96 and they weremeant to be about 50.

‘‘I don’t know what hap-pened, but it was a bit of ashock actually. I went on adiet and had a training pro-gram I did twice a day and Iwasn’t allowed to have

breakfast until after 10 am. Iwas exercising at like8.30 am, it was pretty crazy,but I lost three to four kilos,so it was all worth it. (Theskinfolds) went down toabout 59.’’

Oliver, who this monthcompleted Year 12, hadalways dreamed about play-ing elite football, but had amore realistic career pathmapped out.

A bright student, he took aheavy study load and com-pleted English, health andphysical education, furthermaths, maths methods andchemistry.

‘‘I wanted to be a radi-ographer at the start of theyear, that’s why I did meth-ods and chemistry,’’ hesaid.

‘‘You need about a 92ATAR, so I was thinkingabout doing that if I wasn’tgoing to be playing toomuch footy, then footy sortof took over.’’

Getting drafted was noteven on his radar at the startof this year.

Oliver hoped to play ahandful of games with theBushies and mostly playsenior football at GoulburnValley league club Moor-oopna.

He planned to return tothe TAC Cup as a 19-year-old, transition to VFL thenget picked up by an AFLclub.

Oliver lived in his hometown of Echuca last year andhad limited opportunitieswith Bendigo Pioneers —playing three TAC Cupmatches.

The travel to GoulburnValley Grammar School inShepparton was time con-suming and his parentsbought an apartment inMooroopna, where Oliverlives, to ease his load.

His mother Michelle orone of his grandparents

would come over everynight, cooking, cleaning andtaking him to tutoring.

He was invited to join theBushies’ pre-season train-ing this year, but he spent21⁄2 months of it on thesidelines with osteitis pubis.

Oliver’s season beganslowly and while he was sel-ected in Vic Country’s initialsquad for the under-18 Nat-ional Championships, hewas ultimately overlooked.

‘‘It didn’t bother me toomuch,’’ he said.

‘‘I didn’t really do the pre-season with Bushies, so Iwas pretty unfit. I thought itwas pretty cool to be askedto try out.’’

Oliver polled just one voteafter nine rounds in theMorrish Medal count for theTAC Cup’s most valuableplayer.

Then, much to his disbe-lief, he stormed home with14 votes in seven games.

He averaged 24 disposals(14 contested) a game forthe Bushies at a disposalefficiency of 70 per cent.

He pinpoints improvedfitness to his blisteringback-end of the year, as wellas a two-game VFL stintwith the Tigers.

‘‘I didn’t really work onanything, I think the fitnesscame from match fitnessand I played in the VFL forRichmond, which was a bigturning point,’’ he said.

‘‘After that I started play-ing decent footy. I playedMooroopna seniors lastyear, so it was similar tothat, I didn’t really find ittoo difficult to be honest.Probably the professional-ism, even though they werethe VFL side, they werereally professional withmatch day and training.’’

Oliver played 11 gameswith the Cats last year,including an eliminationfinal.

He said the senior experi-ence provided a more bene-ficial platform than playingat the battling Pioneers.

‘‘I reckon it was betterthan me playing TAC Cuplast year,’’ he said.

‘‘It helped me develop alot more, I’m a lot biggerand stronger this year com-pared to some of the otherboys we were playing again-st.’’

Oliver played junior foot-ball at Echuca, following inthe footsteps of his parentsSteve and Michelle.

When he moved to schoolin Shepparton in Year 7, hecould no longer make theMurray Bombers’ trainingsessions.

His Victorian under-12teammate Jake Cormick’sfather was coaching atMooroopna, so he startingtraining at the Cattery.

He has since modelled hisgame on Benalla exportand Brisbane captain TomRockliff, as well as Carltonbest-and-fairest PatrickCripps.

Oliver knows football willnot be forever and while hisformer hopes of studying tobe a radiographer are on theback burner, he still wantsto go to university.

‘‘Hopefully I’ll get anATAR of about 75 and get afew rural bonuses andhopefully get into exerciseand sports science, it’s athree-year course,’’ he said.

‘‘After footy, depends howlong that goes for, try andget into a position at a footyclub and do strength andconditioning.’’

Oliver plans to go downthe street to Bushies andMooroopna teammate JySimpkin’s house to watchthe draft.

That is if the highly-touted top 10 prospect doesnot get invited to Adelaideon Tuesday night.

CLAYTON OLIVER PROFILEAge: 18Height: 187 cmWeight: 88.5 kgPosition: Inside midfielderPredicted draft pick: 5-102015 TAC Cup games: 162015 VFL games: Two (Richmond)2015 achievements: Morrish medallist, John Byrne med-allist, TAC Cup Team of the Year