Taylor the prize in tug-of-warThe Age
October 4, 2009
THE Sunday Age first met Troy Taylor on a Wednesday afternoon in July. The teenager had just played his final game for the Northern Territory's under-18 football team, attracting attention yet again with his clean pick-ups and sweet skills. Recruiters were speaking of him in terms of a possible first-round pick, but the Gold Coast was intent on signing him outside the draft, as part of its concessions.
Taylor wasn't quite sure what to make of all the fuss, and this choice he never knew he had. Only a few months earlier, he had been in a juvenile detention centre in Darwin; a potential AFL career was the last thing on his mind.
Taylor and his mother Tania spoke openly about the trouble he had got into: latching onto the wrong mates, helping them rob a service station in Darwin, breaching a good-behaviour bond by sneaking out at night and getting into fights, the last of which resulted in him being placed in the detention centre for four months. He walked out in February determined to never go back and since then has moved to Alice Springs with his mum, been welcomed back into the Territory team, starred, played a handful of games for the senior Territory team in the Queensland league and been invited to last week's draft camp in Canberra.
Now, the 17-year-old has essentially become caught in a tug of war.
The Gold Coast, which has first call on Queensland and NT players this year and next, wanted him. Almost straight after the championships, the club's coaches, Guy McKenna, Shaun Hart and Marcus Ashcroft, showed Troy, Tania and Troy's older brother Corey around their club and the district, delivering an impressive sales pitch.
''They showed us the beaches and the club, and they took me to the school where I'd be going with some of the other Gold Coast boys if I went up there,'' said Taylor, who has gone back to year 11 this year. ''It looked heaps good. It looked awesome, actually. I thought it would be pretty good.''
Since then, though, he has had Collingwood, Fremantle, Port Adelaide and North Melbourne visit him. Speaking to them, he started to imagine what it would be like to be at an AFL club next year, not having to wait until 2011, when the Gold Coast will play its first game. At 17, 2011 feels like ages away.
Troy spoke to his mum, who, when all this talk started, had no idea what to make of it. He found a manager, Justin Dover, from Stride's Perth office, who, as an independent voice, tried to present Troy with all the information he needed, and encourage him to make his own choice.
http://www.theage.com.au/news/rfnews/taylor-the-prize-in-tugofwar/2009/10/03/1254418753752.html