As Callan Ward considered his career ahead of his 300th game, the former Giants captain offered a blunt assessment that raised the question as to what constitutes success in footy.
The 34-year-old will become the 103rd player to reach the milestone when the Giants play Essendon, who he barracked for as a boy, at Marvel Stadium on Saturday afternoon.
A foundation Giant, Ward is a best-and-fairest winner, games record holder and former captain of the western Sydney club. But there is a gaping void in his CV, he said this week.
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“The more you go on and the older you get, the more you realise that time is starting to run out. The one reason why we all play football is to play in a premiership,” Ward said.
“Especially once you get to 300 games, you really want to play in a premiership as part of that … so that is the one thing I really want to achieve and there is no doubt everyone at this football club wants to achieve that as well. We are all in it for that one goal and hopefully we can achieve that.
“I have not been hard done by (but) I do think about it sometimes. People talk about it as well. But I probably have not achieved too much in the 300 games, to be honest. I have never won an All Australian, (I have) one best-and-fairest, no premierships. So there is not much on the CV there, so there are definitely things I would like to achieve there. But, oh well, it is what it is.”
Winning a premiership is indisputably the pinnacle of a player’s career and it is what continues to drive Ward, whose Giants sit in third position after eight rounds this season.
But it is difficult to consider the hard-bodied midfielder, who missed the Giants grand final appearance in 2019 with a knee injury, as anything but a success in every other measure.
Ward’s teammates speak glowingly of his leadership and guidance, and not just because he has saved several a few quid over the years by acting as the club’s barber.
His ethic is respected competition wide, as evidenced by the messages he has received over the past week from the chief executives of rival clubs.
And the father-of-two’s work in helping an expansion club begin to flourish in a competitive market in Sydney’s west is likely to prove his legacy.
Oh. Ward’s CV is not that bad, by the way.
He earned a Rising Star nomination with the Western Bulldogs and represented his nation in International Rules. In his first year as a Giant, Ward featured in the AFL’s best 22 under 22.
He is a Kevin Sheedy Medallist. Ward has also claimed the Brett Kirk Medal for best afield against the Swans in the Sydney Derby on a couple of occasions. And in 2018, he earned the Robert Rose Award, which honours the game’s most courageous player.
Ward has been an outstanding player. And that premiership he is after may yet come his way. Not surprisingly, he loves the Giants.
“The premiership would be the icing on the cake, but the journey has been really fun,” he said.
“It is huge. I owe so much to this football club. I will be forever indebted to this footy club for getting me up here and being interested in the first place. They have seen me grow from a boy into a man and I can only thank the Giants for that.”
A WILD RIDE IN THE WEST
Football runs in Ward’s bloodlines, with his grandfather Bill Gunn captaining South Melbourne in the VFL during the 1950s.
He grew up within a few torpedo punts of Whitten Oval, the home of the Western Bulldogs, in Spotswood and was drafted by the club with pick 19 in the 2007 draft.
After making his debut in the first game the following year, Ward featured in 60 games over four years for the Bulldogs, including runs to consecutive preliminary finals in 2009 and 2010.
He was among the most talented young footballers at a time where the introduction of the Gold Coast and Giants created opportunities but also caused contention among clubs.
The defection of Gary Ablett Jnr from Geelong to the Gold Coast was the biggest story in 2010. But the focus on the future of players including eventual Giants Ward, Phil Davis and Tom Scully was also significant in 2011.
Contract negotiations with the Bulldogs were fraught. The club preyed, in part, on his loyalty. But the offer over five years was scarcely half of the reported $4 million over five seasons Ward was offered to head north to join a club considered the AFL’s greatest gamble.
A car ride through Sydney with league legend Kevin Sheedy, who coached the inaugural Giants, helped to seal the deal as he considered his future in footy aged just 21.
But his exit from Whitten Oval was relatively messy.
Former chief executive Simon Garlick, who is now the Dockers’ CEO, described the loss of Ward as “incredibly disappointing” while football boss James Fantasia said the departure would hurt the club more than Ablett’s exit from Geelong.
“You’ve got to remember that we actually put together a pretty solid package, for a young man developing his craft before the season started,” Fantasia said.
Ward, who did not reveal his intentions until after a turbulent 2011 for the Bulldogs, was part of the Dogs’ side which thrashed Fremantle by 46 points at Marvel Stadium.
But he departed with some hurt as he was booed by fans mid-match, which prompted criticism from interim Western Bulldogs coach Paul Williams.
“You don’t need to do that, no matter who it is,” he said.
“I don’t think any of us in footy, or in sport, like anyone getting booed, whether it is your teammate or the opposition. It’s not the Aussie way.”
While the intercity rivalry with Sydney is the Giants most significant, the stoushes against the Western Bulldogs have also been particularly spicy over the past decade.
Former Bulldogs stars Brad Johnson, Daniel Giansiracusa, Ryan Griffin and Dylan Addison praised him this week, stating he had shown early on that he would be a star of the game. But it is a different generation of Bulldogs now, as Ward noted during the week.
“Almost everyone has changed since my time there. If I walked in those doors, I would not even know anyone aside from those two or three who I played with,” he said.
A GIANTS TRAILBLAZER
Ward kicked the first goal scored by the Giants and captained the club for 157 games, meaning he is among the 23 skippers to lead a VFL/AFL team for at least 150 games.
But the veteran, who was named in the extended All Australian squad of 40 on three occasions without making the final team, said he initially struggled with the responsibility.
As his current coach Adam Kingsley said, Ward is “pretty quietly spoken” and at a tender age he was thrust into the role of trying to build a young club just entering the competition.
When Ward arrived at the Giants, he described himself as shy, naive, lacking in confidence and having doubts as to his ability to live up to a bigger wage, let alone captain older men.
There was, he said, “definitely some tough times” during a period where the Giants trained at makeshift venues and changed in temporary facilities, among other initial challenges.
The Giants managed just two wins in their first season and copped 14 losses of 50 points or more, with five of those in triple figures including a 162-point loss to Hawthorn at the MCG.
A year later they lost another five games by at least 100 points, including a 135-point loss at home, while notching just the solitary win over Melbourne in Rd 19.
“I knew it was going to be hard and I was probably hesitant to take it,” he told The Green Room.
“They were tough (times). It is hard to explain, because the expectation on us wasn’t that high internally. We raised that over the years. A lot of it was about working really hard. Getting the foundations in place. Training really hard. Starting that culture from the ground up, which is one thing I have really enjoyed about coming up.
“Probably over the last six or seven years … it has been a lot different.”
A GIANT IMPACT
Haven’t achieved much? Not much of a CV? The tributes from those who have played alongside Ward at Whitten Oval and with the Giants stamp him as a champion, so too the quality of his football and his durability.
The Giants have only missed the finals twice since 2016 and made runs to the preliminary final on two occasions along with the grand final appearance in 2019 when thrashed by Richmond.
Described as having a “heart full of gold and a head full of cement”, the leadership and stability Ward has provided around the club has been a factor in the Giants consistency.
Former coach Leon Cameron said it had been a “privilege to not only coach you but to get to know you”. Dylan Shiel called him the “most courageous player” he stepped out with. Saints skipper Jack Steele and former co-captain Phil Davis chimed in as well in a club tribute. Ex-Carlton captain Marc Murphy said he would love to have played alongside him. Geelong superstar and inaugural Giant Jeremy Cameron described him as “one of those blokes you just loved running out with”.
St Kilda champion and former assistant coach Lenny Hayes said “his attack on the ball was unmatched”. He praised his ethic and contribution as “selfless and durable” during the daunting situation in 2019 when he injured his knee.
Former Brisbane champion Luke Power loved captaining with him in the infancy of the Giants history.
Current teammate Tom Green, who has overcome an ankle injury to be named for Saturday’s match, was among those to laud his contribution to the Giants.
“He is too humble to say it but it is not hyperbole to say he is one of, if not the most important person in the club’s history. He was the first co-captain. He has been a captain the majority of time of the club’s existence, and we know how important that (role) is for a football club,” Green said.
“It is nice to say nice words about him, because he is a lovely man (who has) obviously been a superstar for two decades and he could not have had a bigger impact … in our existence.I think the AFL is lucky that he came to the Giants and set us up the way that he has, because he has been a role model for football in New South Wales.”
A LANDMARK MOMENT AND A LEGACY CREATED
A final word goes to his current coach Kent Kingsley, who Ward credits with rejuvenating his career after he hit the wall during the latter stages of the Covid-era.
“Coming here at such a young age, being trusted to be captain at such a young age, probably suggests the quality of him as a young man but also the trust he has from other people,” Kingsley said.
“He is a great teammate. A great person to coach. A really trusted person. At the end of the day, that is the most important thing. You walk away from the game … he has earned the respect from everyone he has come across.
“He is a champion. He prepares like one. He performs like one. But he is the utmost gentleman. He is highly respectful to everyone he comes across. He leads by example in that aspect as well.”
Ward may yet win a premiership given the Giants strength this season. But Kingsley said the legacy he leaves, whenever his retirement comes, will be seen in the players he has led.
“He plays the right way. He plays the way we want to play. He is tough and hard in the contest, which is what we want to be, and he leads the way for us,” Kingsley said.
“Our young guys look at the way he does things and thinks, ‘If I am going to be that sort of player, which everyone aspires to be, this is what I need to do’. And he probably does it more through actions than words. He is pretty quietly spoken. His actions are incredibly loud.”
Source Agencies
