Joe Scott never dreamed he would one day be playing on Daniel Kerr, the former West Coast Eagles star he idolised as a youngster.
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And it’s likely Daniel Kerr never imagined taking on an opponent whose matchday preparation will involve pregnancy scanning a couple of thousand sheep.
While Kerr will fly in on Friday morning for his one-off appearance with CSU Bushpigs, his East Wagga-Kooringal opponents have a more mundane preparation for the Robertson Oval encounter.
“Work’s been busy this week… (Thursday) and Friday I’ll have about 3000 sheep to scan each day,” Scott said.
But the East Wagga-Kooringal vice-captain said the Hawks are as excited as CSU about Kerr’s appearance.
“Definitely, you don’t get to see many players like this that you get to play on each week,” Scott said.
“It’ll be a great opportunity for the side to play around someone like that, it’s going to be different.”
The task of keeping Kerr quiet won’t just fall to Scott, with experienced midfielders Ben Absolum and Chris Gordon to get their turn along with ex-defender Jacob Tiernan who did a good job restricting North Wagga’s Lachie Highfield last week.
“Jacob’s been brought into the midfield. He was someone you could see the potential in and he put his hand up (this season)… and the last two rounds he’s really stood up,” Scott said.
But it will take a team effort to limit the influence of the 2006 premiership star who played 220 AFL games, and is enjoying a multi-state roadshow return to football.
Growing up, Scott used to watch in awe as Kerr went about his business alongside Chris Judd and Ben Cousins.
“Just his style of football – the gut-running,” Scott said.
“You can see them put so many efforts in… you can never rule them out of a contest. No matter where he is on the ground, he’s going to be involved.”
There’ll be no red carpet for the star, but Scott said he will get a warm welcome.
“There’ll be a few of us I’m sure that will stir him up… try and get him off his game,” Scott said. “I’m sure he’s copped it everywhere else but we’ll be ready to give him the East Wagga-style.”
Friday night’s senior game gets underway at 7.30pm at Robertson Oval.
With the Hawks coming off their first loss since last June and CSU gearing up for one of club’s biggest games in years, there’s no under-estimating the danger.
“They’ll be up and about,” Scott said.
“They’re definitely going to rise to the occasion, especially Friday night, under lights at Robbo. I don’t think they’ll have played many games at Robbo as a club so to be here for them it’s going to be big.
“And their ‘get out of jail free’ card will be to kick it near Kerr and hope that sparks something.”