The high-flying Seville senior side, who are currently undefeated after nine rounds in Outer East Division One, has had a setback for their strong season with the season-ending injury to captain Nathan O’Keefe.
O’Keefe, affectionately known as ‘Cooney’, hurt his knee in the first quarter of the Blues’ 71-point win over a struggling Belgrave side. Scans confirmed on Friday 3 June that he’d suffered a ruptured ACL as well as medial ligament damage.
Seville’s Football Manager and former coach Kane Shore said O’Keefe has never missed a game through a football-related injury before this.
“When he stayed down, we knew something was up, but we never thought it was going to be this serious, but he’s normally very durable,” he said.
“It happened in a contest that, from the boundary didn’t look like a whole lot. He’s currently going through the process of organising surgery, which will hopefully be very soon. We were shocked to see such a legend of our club and the league go down like that.”
The strong marking key forward was the 2021 Harold Ramage medallist for Division One, the award for the best and fairest player in the league that season, averaging 23.5 disposals, 7.4 marks (of which 2.6 were contested), 2.8 goals and 147 ranking points per game, third in the competition.
Mr Shore said he believes O’Keefe was averaging 25 disposals and five goals a game this season, but the strong side will have to step up to cover for him.
“There are still some players to come back into the side, quite a few young blokes, but they are in a good position. Head coach Chris Murphy has gotten them into a very good position and hopefully, they can keep trudging along,” he said.
“Football is a team game and while you need our X-Factors like Nathan around but with other guys like Josh Weightman and Rob Petracca around, anything can happen. It’s not just about individuals but what they can add to a squad and that’s how you win finals and win big games as a team.”
O’Keefe was drafted to North Melbourne with pick 59 in the 2008 AFL national draft, playing two games and scoring one goal in the 2010 AFL season before being delisted at the end of the 2010 season. It says a lot about his loyalty that the only club he has ever featured for other than Seville is the Kangaroos. He also was part of the Seville 2019 premiership-winning side, kicking eight goals in the grand final.
Mr Shore said O’Keefe is a perfect example of having juniors come back to the club and setting the tone.
“He really is a born and bred Seville boy, he went down and played at the highest level and came back to be a legend of our club,” he said.
“He’s won league best and fairest now and four or five club best and fairest awards and a premiership, and even coaches the teams of his kids at the junior club and lives across the road from the ground.”
In a player profile for Seville in 2020, ‘Cooney’ interestingly shared that he always puts his left boot on first. Hopefully, we will see him donning that left boot again consistently next season.
Mr Shore said Seville will keep going into every game confident in their ability.
“We’re just concentrating on ourselves, it’s very much about getting the boys to worry about what we can control with a really tough patch coming up with five away games including tough games at Gembrook and Emerald,” he said.
“We are just enjoying being back playing football.”
