Gumbleton Makes Mark With Tough, Brave Performances

The Age

Thursday June 29, 2006

EMMA QUAYLE

SOMETIMES, a footballer's on-field personality reflects precisely what he's like off the ground. Other times, it doesn't.

The thing Scott Gumbleton likes most about football is that it lets him hurl himself around. "You can get out there and run and jump all day," he said. "I like to get a bit physical."

At other times, though, the words low-key and contained describe the young West Australian, who isn't particularly interested in making people look at him.

In his first game of this under-18s carnival, against Vic Country last Sunday, Gumbleton was clonked in the head during his very first contest of the day. He played out the game with some whiplash, but no complaints, and was one of his team's best players.

The teenager has spent all of this season in Peel Thunder's senior team, playing at centre half-forward and making the senior WA state squad, even though his struggling club has found it hard to get easy balls to him.

Tall, brave and bold, Gumbleton is considered one of the three best tall players on offer at this year's draft. But he isn't ready to worry at all about that.

"I just try not to think about it. I just try to play footy and keep that stuff out of my head," he said. "If you concentrate on playing your best footy, that stuff will look after itself."

Gumbleton played for WA at last year's carnival, mostly at full-forward, and has come to Melbourne this year feeling a little bigger, and capable of playing more positions.

He took seven marks yesterday, playing mostly at centre half-forward, but his team lost its second game in a row, to Vic Metro, and must topple South Australia at Princes Park on Sunday to head home with a win.

Metro and Vic Country, which have won both their matches, will play for the title after that match, with Country likely to be without its best defender. Lachie Hansen was knocked out and carried off early in the last quarter yesterday, after bravely running back to take a mark.

Alan McConnell took Gumbleton, who is related to North Melbourne premiership defender Frank Gumbleton "somewhere along the line", to Ireland last year with the AIS-AFL Academy, and was struck straight away by his courage.

"He plays in front, all the time, and he doesn't let the ball over the back," McConnell said.

"He always watches the ball in marking contests no matter where the contact's coming from, which is what good players do.

"He's a quiet kid. Shy's probably not the right word, but he's a bit reserved. People have had big raps on him in Perth, and he's handled that exceptionally."

Gumbleton toured Ireland that year with a few of his WA teammates, and Hansen.

The pair had played on each other during the national under-16s championships before then, and struck up a bigger friendship on the trip. They spent parts of Sunday's match between Vic Country and WA on each other, too, which Gumbleton enjoyed.

"I like it. It's nice to see some of the other AIS guys around, and with Lachie it's good because we get to play on each other and challenge each other," he said.

"It's pretty hard, to come over here and play. The footy's a lot more physical and it's hard to get free and run and find space like you can at home.

"When you play on some of the same guys over the years, you can judge yourself a bit more, and use them to try to work out how you're going."