One of the great footy streaks remains alive after Hawthorn moved quickly to secure a young VFL star just days before the pre-season supplemental selection period (SSP) deadline.
Foxfooty.com.au understands the Hawks have agreed to sign gun intercept defender Ethan Phillips for the 2024 AFL season in the wake of James Blanck’s recent ACL injury.
Phillips, a 197cm key defender, grew his game significantly in 2022 playing for Port Melbourne in the VFL, claiming the Fothergill-Round-Mitchell Medal as the league’s best young talent.
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While he went undrafted in 2022, he had another terrific season with the Borough in 2023, averaging 17.6 disposals, 11.0 intercepts and 8.6 marks while going at an efficiency of 84 per cent by foot from 18 games to finish fifth in Port’s best and fairest count.
Phillips, 24, late last year moved to the Box Hill Hawks in an attempt to win a spot on an AFL list.
And after Blanck was ruled out for the entire 2024 season after rupturing his ACL in an intra-club clash on Thursday, Hawthorn has opted to bring in another key defender in Phillips to replace him before Monday’s SSP deadline.
With Sam Clohesy rookied-listed by the Suns last November and Phillips joining the Hawks, it means the past 17 consecutive Fothergill-Round-Mitchell Medal winners have been drafted onto an AFL list. Some of those players include Michael Barlow, Michael Hibberd, Kane Lambert, Nic Newman, Luke Ryan and Bayley Fritsch.
Phillips also becomes the latest player to be signed by Hawthorn after coming through VFL-affiliate Box Hill, joining the likes of current coach Sam Mitchell, David Mirra, Lachie Bramble, Blanck and Jai Newcombe.
Hawks captain James Sicily on Saturday said Blanck’s long-term knee injury, along with Changkuoth Jiath’s hamstring setback, rattled his teammates during Thursday’s internal hit-out.
But Sicily said he was “still confident” the backline would hold up well.
“We’ve got young Jai Serong, who just turned 21 and played a couple of games and had a good pre-season. We still have Denver (Grainger-Barras), we’ve got (Josh) Weddle who’s 195cm,” Sicily told reporters.
“We will be stretched, but there will be some sort of silver lining to come out of it.”
Sicily revealed that Blanck on Friday still rocked up to the Hawks’ team photo commitments – a day after his knee setback.
“I don’t know if I could have done the same thing,” Sicily said.
“Life is not fair sometimes, particularly in Blancky’s case, where he has put in an enormous amount of work in the pre-season and to go down with only 28 days to go until we play … (it) is a gut wrenching feeling.
“But I have enormous confidence in his ability to return to where he left off, because I went through the same thing with the same people that helped me at the club.”
