Hawthorn midfielder Isaac Smith is a triple-premiership player...and he didn't even expect the club to draft him!
Smith told SEN Breakfast on Tuesday he was "surprised" when the Hawks took him with their first pick in the 2010 draft, thinking he would end up at the Gold Coast or North Melbourne.
โI think Gold Coast had a lot of picks that year and also North Melbourne were the feeder club to North Ballarat, so they were probably the two teams I was expecting to get picked up by,โ Smith toldย SEN Breakfast.
โWhen Hawthorn took me, I was quite surprised actually. The only two guys that I really knew in the AFL were Luke Breust and Matt Suckling โฆ it was awesome to land at Hawthorn because I already had a connection and the rest is history.โ
Smith has faith where the Hawks are at as the competition reset's looms.
โI think the coaching and recruiting staff have put together a pretty good list,โ Smith said.
โWeโve got blokes in over the last few years like Tom Scully, Chad Wingard, Tom Mitchell, Jaeger O'Meara, Jon Patton, Sam Frost โฆ it feels that at this point in time weโve got a really mature list.
โWeโve also got some young guys like James Worpel, Ollie Hanrahan, Jack Scrimshaw, Mitchell Lewis, those type of guys that are coming through and really impacting the side.
โMaybe over the last couple of years we havenโt batted as deep but at the moment it feels like weโre batting as deep as ever since Iโve been at the club.
"Hopefully that translates to wins.โ
