AFLW<\/a>\u2019s leading players, she had been primed to propel the Swans towards the finals in 2024. But in training before the second round, she felt pain in her right knee.<\/p>\n\u201cI felt like, heading into the season last year, I\u2019d really honed in on being a full-time footballer,\u201d she says. \u201cAnd then I got told \u2018you\u2019ve done your knee\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
She didn\u2019t want her teammates to worry before their second match, so she tried to keep secret her injury\u2019s severity. But while they were on the field preparing, word got around. The Swans lost by 16 points to the Saints, the first defeat in a season that \u2013 without Molloy \u2013 saw them underachieve.<\/p>\n
The then 25-year-old faced her own adversity. She had experienced back and foot injuries in the past, but this was different. \u201cNothing prepares you for an ACL. Holy moly, the ACL is a different beast,\u201d she says. \u201cYou take a graft from your hamstring to turn it into a ligament, and you just can\u2019t speed up that process.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the early weeks, she was either on crutches or on the couch, icing her knee in agony. And that was before the rehabilitation began. \u201cRunning patterns, running lines, turning direction, tedious, tedious, tedious drills that you have to respect, but they friggin\u2019 suck.\u201d<\/p>\n
She admits it was a difficult time. Her family was in Victoria, her partner in Queensland. She wondered why she was doing it at all, given a return to professional sport meant a good chance she could do her knee again. And although she was co-captain of the Swans, Molloy didn\u2019t want to impose herself on her teammates.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou don\u2019t want to put your stuff on someone else\u2019s plate, especially being in season and as a leader,\u201d she says. \u201cI felt like my responsibility was to protect my teammates, and make sure that they were preparing the best they could.\u201d<\/p>\n
She channelled her energies into her rehabilitation, targeting a return for round one this year. Her surgeon described her as \u201coverconfident\u201d, yet still she hit the milestones.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you see me on that machine, it\u2019s a test that you need to pass,\u201d she says, recalling the photograph of her seated and lifting her leg. \u201cI hope I never have to sit on one of those machines again.\u201d<\/p>\n
But through the repetition, the routine, came something else. She began to recognise that this was an opportunity, and the time in the gym could provide her a new edge. She revisited her whole lifestyle \u2013 from nutrition, to sleep \u2013 to see what she could refine.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery decision I made was about \u2026 how much time am I on my feet, what shoes am I wearing, am I setting myself up for success,\u201d she says. \u201cI\u2019d finish one session, and I\u2019d already start thinking about the next one.\u201d<\/p>\n
Earlier this month Molloy returned to play in a warm-up match, one month ahead of schedule. After two outings this AFLW<\/a> season, she leads the competition with 11 goals and her side is unbeaten. But ahead of Saturday\u2019s clash against Geelong, she admits she doesn\u2019t want to \u201cget too ahead of myself\u201d.<\/p>\nThough her knee once ruled her world, now there is more to it. \u201cWhat rules my world now is showing up for my teammates,\u201d she says. \u201cMaking sure I\u2019m not letting the person next to me down in whatever I\u2019m doing.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cMy knee ruled my whole world,\u201d the Sydney Swans forward Chloe Molloy says, reflecting on her past year.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":104694,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-104693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104693"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104693\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/104694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}