takes time away from the club to deal with a personal issue<\/a>.<\/p>\nVeteran midfielder Tom Atkins, meanwhile, has praised the impact of recruit James Worpel in his early days at the Cats, while also dismissing suggestions that a recent spate of injuries across the competition is because the off-season break is too long.<\/p>\n
The Cats announced on Monday that Stengle has not returned to the club from the Christmas break, but he is expected to return to training “in the short term”.<\/p>\n
Tyson Stengle warms up ahead of the 2025 Toyota AFL Grand Final on September 27, 2025. Picture: AFL Photos\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
Atkins said the 27-year-old has the full support of his teammates.<\/p>\n
“We love Tyson, and we’re just hopeful that everything’s okay with him and with his family,” he said.<\/p>\n
“So hopefully he’s able to get the time that he needs, and then when he comes back, he’ll be ready to go.”<\/p>\n
Atkins enjoyed a breakout season in 2025, breaking the all-time record for the most tackles in a season and enjoying a career high for average disposals. And the 30-year-old is set to get even more support in the midfield this year after the arrival of Worpel from Hawthorn, plus the return of Tanner Bruhn.<\/p>\n
Bruhn was stood down by the AFL last year after police charged him in a sexual assault case, but the stand-down order was lifted last November when the charges were withdrawn.<\/p>\n
Worpel, meanwhile, joined the Cats as a free agent from the Hawks and Atkins says he has made an immediate impact.<\/p>\n
James Worpel after joining Geelong from Hawthorn ahead of the 2026 season. Picture: Geelong Cats<\/p>\n
“I’ve enjoyed working with ‘Worps’, just having his experience in there has been great,” Atkins said.<\/p>\n
“Obviously he’s a really strong, physical player who’s got really good endurance as well.<\/p>\n
“That’s probably one thing I’ve been surprised with him; he’s probably seen more as an inside player, but he’s really running well, transitioning well as well.<\/p>\n
“We’re always evolving as a team, so if we add someone like Worps … it might change my role, but it’s only going to make us better.<\/p>\n
“I’m not going into this season expecting to do exactly what I did last year. (I) always love having new talent added to the team, especially if they are going to help us win.”<\/p>\n
Jack Martin at Geelong training in May, 2025. Picture: AFL Photos<\/p>\n
The Cats, like all clubs, returned to training last week after the Christmas break having also enjoyed some time off following the end of last season.<\/p>\n
Port Adelaide champion Kane Cornes has long argued players have too much time away from the club during the pre-season and are at risk of getting injured when they return to training, a suggestion that was supported this week when high-profile players like Clayton Oliver, Darcy Moore and Jeremy Howe suffered soft-tissue injuries.<\/p>\n
But Atkins dismissed the argument, saying players are still doing fitness work during their time off.<\/p>\n
“I’d probably disagree with that. I really enjoy having a break \u2013 I think I need it,” he said. “It’s a pretty intense season and I’m just a fairly intense person.<\/p>\n
“It’s not like I’m just sitting at home on the couch when I have a break. We’re all training, sometimes five times a week. I don’t know if it seems like in our off-season everyone thinks that we just go and do nothing, but we’re all still very active.<\/p>\n
“At some stages we train four times a week running, and then we’ll have three weight sessions a week.<\/p>\n
“So as far as I’m concerned, I’m always physically prepared to get back into training by the time we come back and I would say that’s pretty consistent across the rest of our group as well.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tom Atkins says Tyson Stengle has the full support of his teammates as he deals with a personal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":419413,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85,83],"class_list":["post-419412","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","tag-text"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/419412","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=419412"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/419412\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/419413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=419412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=419412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=419412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}