Brid Stack: Differences from home extend far beyond a summer Christmas

Brid Stack and family meet Santa on the beach in Bayview, New South Wales

On Christmas morning, we had to rouse Ógie to wake him up. He had tried so hard to stay awake to see Santa the previous night that he had just burned himself out.

Upon inspection of the half-eaten carrot and the presents under the tree, Ógie couldn’t wait to tell his grandparents that Santa had visited him in Sydney. The WhatsApp videocalls were plentiful throughout the day as Santa also visited Ógie’s cousins on the other side of the world.

Christmas in Sydney was a very different experience. At home, every village, town, and city are adorned in Christmas lights, but that’s certainly not the case here.

The sunny weather and the seafood lunch instead of turkey and ham just wasn’t the same. Still, it was nice to experience it nonetheless and we celebrated Christmas Day on Coogee Beach in 30-degree heat under a watermelon shaped umbrella.

Brid Stack and family on Coogee Beach, Sydney

The beach was packed with red Santa hats and sunburnt lads with big Irish heads on them. A little taste of home but not a box of USA biscuits to be seen anywhere.

You’d miss it. We definitely found ourselves ringing home a lot more over the past week. Covid had made the Irish Christmas look very different too. My brother and his family couldn’t travel home from Birmingham as they received a positive test just days before Christmas. Similarly, my sister had to isolate away from my parents up until Christmas Day so it was touch and go whether she would be eating the Christmas dinner out in the garden.

For the Giants, the Christmas break could very well have ended in an anti-climax on the playing field. On the previous Friday afternoon, we were due to fly to Adelaide for our challenge game against the Adelaide Crows on Saturday, December 19.

Of the 14 teams in the competition, we were the only team that had to travel interstate to fulfil the fixture, so it was always going to carry risk. Then came the gamechanger, literally — one of our players tested positive for Covid-19 two days before we were due to travel.

Because South Australia’s border restrictions are far stricter than New South Wales, our team doctor had to contact South Australia Health to risk-assess the trip. The potential of any one of our squad testing positive upon entering Adelaide would have resulted in the whole group going into medical quarantine for 14 days at the club’s expense. Just imagine the bones of 50 people in our travelling party having to quarantine in 50 separate rooms hundreds of miles from their families over the Christmas period.

The pitfalls were too great and so the trip wasn’t worth the risk. The game was cancelled. All this information was relayed to us via an emergency Zoom meeting at 9.30pm the night before we were due to travel. Cora was in our apartment when we found out. To say we were deflated was an understatement.

The lack of a practice match probably didn’t have any real impact on Adelaide given how settled their team is, but our new-look team was itching for a run out. We needed to see where we were at and we wanted to test ourselves against one of the best teams in the competition.

I was gunning for the game. Absolutely gunning. I felt I needed a full game under my belt for my own confidence, but it was all out of our control.

The anti-climax was so palpable everywhere that Alan McConnell, our head coach, was fearful that there might be a dip in motivation after the game was pulled.

Training was rescheduled at our grounds for the time the match was due to throw in. We trained like dogs for two hours on that Saturday morning in 33 degrees heat. It was brutal stuff, the hardest session I’ve done since I got here, but the intensity was ramped up from the immense effort players brought to the pitch that day.

Everyone was so determined to try and compensate for the game experience we had missed out on that when the session was over, we all basically collapsed in a heap in the shade. We sat there happy and content that the morning had been put to maximum use, and that the final block of preseason had ended.

Later that evening, as is tradition, we all went to Alan’s house where he and his lovely partner Susie hosted us for Christmas dinner and Secret Santa. We all had to make sure we did our antigen tests beforehand so there were loads of hugs and embraces on such a brilliant evening.

The food and company was amazing. Alan was flat out carving ham and we were flat out eating it. There wasn’t much talk of football, we all had a few drinks and the Kris Kringle was a great success.

The theme of it was sustainability so plenty homemade presents were on show. Our matchday runner, Ash, gave me one of his kids’ toys for Ógie, who was delighted with his pre-loved firetruck.

I had Damo, our assistant coach and head coach of the men’s VFL team. Damo is sports mad so naturally I got him a hurley and sliotar kindly given to me by Brendan Coleman, a great Valley Rovers man and a good friend of ours here in Sydney.

Damo has watched loads of hurling games on YouTube and he was so delighted with the present that we organised a puck around at the Giants complex the next day. His plan for the Christmas was to find a wall in Melbourne, where he’s from, and to come back ready to show off his silky first touch. I wouldn’t put it past the man.

With the group breaking up for a week, Cárthach, Ógie, Cora and I hoped to go to beautiful Port Douglas in Queensland for a few days away. But by travelling interstate, we ran the risk of getting stuck across the border. And as we have seen over the last two years, governors can shut borders and flights can be cancelled without a moment’s notice. We felt it wasn’t worth the risk so we stayed put instead.

Since I’ve come to Sydney, I usually get my hair done by a Wexford girl in Coogee, a trip that normally takes 40 minutes from my apartment in Olympic Park. This time when I visited her before Christmas, my journey took double that. I was held up at numerous testing centers where cars were spilling out onto the street as far as the eye could see.

The news that night confirmed that over 150,000 people tested in Sydney that same day. Our group were given plenty of antigen tests for the festive period and we tested ourselves most days. If we ate out, we ensured there was outdoor dining available so we didn’t put ourselves in a compromising situation. With the season so close, I won’t say you’re constantly on edge, but you really are mindful of doing the right thing in absolutely everything you do throughout the day.

Given how tight-knit the Giants club is, if one player contracts Covid, the repercussions are massive, not only for our own squad but for anyone who works or trains at the Giants complex.

That extends to the men’s AFL team, the Netball team, the VFL team, the academy teams as well as all the auxiliary staff that keep the show on the road.

I certainly didn’t want to be negligent and risk putting other families and our entire club’s activities at risk. Only last week, after the Sydney Swans AFL team finished their pre-Christmas get-together, at least 11 of their players tested positive for Covid-19 which would have compromised any group training for at least a two-week period. Everyone follows protocols here to the nth degree but it’s becoming more difficult to keep Covid away from a large group.

Our Christmas break went from December 20 until the 27th but within that time TR, our strength and conditioning coach, had given us two sessions to complete. These combined a mixture of running and gym work. So, on December 21 and 23, Alan took the Sydney-based crew for a 7km and 9km session in blistering heat, while Damo looked after the Melbourne gang.

On the Wednesday in the lead up to Christmas, we travelled out to Bri Harvey’s family farm in the Blue Mountains. Bri is our Head of Football at the Giants and I swear she’s half Irish given her sarcasm levels.

The place was just beautiful, a 7,000-acre farm of lush pastural land. Yes, that’s three zeros. A huge expanse of land that contained a mine and a rapid filled river. We met her whole family, each one funnier and more sarcastic than the last. Their warm welcome and hilarious dynamic made us briefly forget just how far away we were from our own families as we laughed the night away in the majestic Blue Mountains.

We were back with a bang on the 27th and it’s all systems go for the next two weeks before Round One in the Gold Coast. The few days break did the team a power of good as everyone came back with a determination to pick up where we left off as a group before Christmas.

Training is going well for me at the moment, but there is still a lot to get to grips with. I have a whole new appreciation of the sport. Yes, there are similarities between LGFA and AFLW but having a full pre-season behind me, I see the massive disparity that exists between the amateur game and the professional game.

The schedule is extremely intense. On training days, it’s not unusual for any player to be at the club for at least seven hours. For example, on Mondays and Wednesdays, I arrive at the club at 2pm and usually leave around 9pm.

Prior to training, I usually meet with our backline coach Darren for extra contact work where I try to prioritise my tackle technique. The main on-field training usually lasts about two hours. Before that we prep with physio appointments, team meetings, line meetings, video analysis and activation exercises.

Following the on-field training, we complete a full gym session. Cora and I along with a few others usually stay on to make use of the recovery pools in the club.

The following day, I usually go through my video edits that are coded from the previous training. I find the video sessions invaluable, while the individual advice that I receive is massively important in helping me to improve my awareness of the game.

The level of detail that Alan and his line coaches go into tactically is out of this world and is something that I’ve never been exposed to previously.

Time is paramount in a professional environment but the access to every resource imaginable is also key. On any given day we can have up to seven or eight medical staff available at training.

These include a team doctor, three head physios and three or four masseurs. There is also access to the club psychologist if needed. We usually meet him as a group at least once a week and as individuals if needed.

During training, the IT team is recording, editing and coding footage on their laptops that can be used by coaches and players immediately after the session. A full printout of the data is placed on the gym wall for us all to study before we head home.

They also work in line with TR, the S&C coach, relaying live feedback during the session to identify if players have hit certain targets. These targets can include distance covered, top speed and smash load. Based on this data, you will often see individuals being pulled out of drills in order to meet individual targets or to manage their training load to prevent injury.

On field, we have specialised coaches to cater for each line group. Given the number of stoppages in the game, structure is key, and their role is crucial to ensure that everyone knows their role.

Ady, the property manager, is one of the most important people at the club, ensuring that all equipment is in place for training and match day. Head coach Alan and Damo, his assistant, ensure that on-field matters run smoothly while Bri and Gail see to it that all welfare and administrative matters are tended to. It’s a well-oiled machine.

The season is only around the corner now and, while I’d like to have more game-time under my belt, I’ve taken great reassurance from how preseason has gone for me and for the squad.

As I finally get ready to play AFLW competitively and attack the season with everything I have, I really hope that those big-day experiences with Cork will stand to me going forward.

I know that they will.