Missing out on Richmond’s premiership drives Reece Conca (West Aust.)

[one-eyed]

Missing out on Richmond’s premiership drives WA’s Reece Conca

Shayne Hope
West Australian
3 October 2017

Luckless WA midfielder Reece Conca will use the pain of missing out on Richmond’s drought-breaking premiership to reignite his injury-ravaged career next season.

Conca was a first-round draft pick from Perth in 2010 and played at least 17 matches in each of his first four seasons.

But he has managed just 15 senior appearances in the past three years as a succession of largely soft-tissue injuries have taken their toll.

Conca, 25, played the first six matches this year in a new role across half-back before breaking down with an injury to the Lisfranc joint in his right foot that sidelined him for three months.

He returned via Richmond’s VFL side late in the season and played in the narrow grand final loss to Port Melbourne, but couldn’t force his way into the senior team and had to watch from the stands as the Tigers clinched a long-awaited flag on Saturday.

“I’ve been at this great club for seven years now and all I’ve ever wanted is some success,” Conca said. “Yeah, it’s disappointing not to be out there, but it’s just amazing. It really is.

“Twelve months ago if you’d said we’d be here, honestly, it would’ve been hard to see it.

“But we’ve made some incredible changes and we’ve got an amazing playing group. I’m just so proud of the boys out there.

“This is the pinnacle and it’s where every AFL player wants to be. It drives me to work my way back into the team next year and I have no doubt that we’ll have success again next season.

“There’s no reason we can’t go back-to-back and hopefully I’m a part of that one.”

Conca admitted his latest frustrating injury, sustained during the round six defeat to Adelaide, had been hard to deal with at times.

“This one was pretty tough, but I’m in a lot better headspace than I have been in the past,” he said.

“I’m a lot more mature and I was able to deal with the injuries mentally a lot better, but physically it starts to wear down on you.

“I was really proud of myself that I got through my rehab and managed to play some games at the end of the year.

“We played in a VFL grand final, which was amazing.

“The result was obviously disappointing, but this (AFL premiership) makes up for that.

“I’m just glad I got back to playing some footy and I can flow that on to next year.

“I got my body in pretty good shape towards the end of the year and the foot is feeling pretty good. I’ll have a little freshen-up this off-season and get right back into it.”

Teammate Daniel Rioli’s last-quarter injury from the grand final has been confirmed as a broken left foot.

https://thewest.com.au/sport/afl/missing-out-on-richmonds-premiership-drives-was-reece-conca-ng-b88617142z

[(•))(©™]

Yeh.
Hopefully back across the Nullarbor

[🏅Dooks]

Yeh.
Hopefully back across the Nullarbor

 

[one-eyed]

Tiger Reece Conca won't be pursuing a move home to Perth contrary to reports earlier this week. The contracted defender missed Richmond's glorious finals campaign after being restricted to six senior games by a foot injury this season, but is understood to be very happy at Punt Rd.

http://www.afl.com.au/news/2017-10-04/trade-wrap-magpies-enter-the-ring-for-watts

[Simonator]

There's no one in our premiership team that I'd take out for him. He's no good as depth either because of his injury problems, he's done.

[The Machine]

Keeper for mine

[mat073]

He's so far down the pecking order it's not funny .

Got to start playing kids like C Ellis , Menadue and Short before the likes of Conca .

[pmac21]

Worth keeping, we should be keeping our depth players as we are not going to have a year injury wise like this year again,
Reece is solid AFL standard player. 

[yandb]

Well entrenched in our top five players after the first five rounds.

Some posters have selective memories, Conca was flying this year until some player landed on his foot damaging his ligament.

[Simonator]

Well entrenched in our top five players after the first five rounds.

Some posters have selective memories, Conca was flying this year until some player landed on his foot damaging his ligament.

That's just the problem, he just gets injured too much. As someone else mentioned the likes of menadue, short, c ellis need development over him.

[🏅Dooks]

He's so far down the pecking order it's not funny .

Got to start playing kids like C Ellis , Menadue and Short before the likes of Conca .

this.

[mat073]

Add Markov to the list too.

[lamington]

2018 VFL premiership player maybe ?

[Yeahright]

Worth keeping, we should be keeping our depth players as we are not going to have a year injury wise like this year again,
Reece is solid AFL standard player.

You know it's pretty funny, I feel like we hear this a lot (nearly every year). We've been very good at managing players injury wise. Sure we have the few that get injured a fair bit (Grimes, Conca, Astbury, Deledio spring to mind) but outside of that we've been very good at keeping players on the park

[wayne]

If he's happy to be depth, that's fine.