\n The GIANTS will unearth a debutant on the grand stage of Friday night footy.\n <\/p>\n
The GIANTS will unearth a debutant on the grand stage of Friday night footy, with exciting teenager Ollie Hannaford named to make his AFL debut against Collingwood.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Drafted with pick\u00a018\u00a0in the 2024 Draft, Hannaford is a tough and dynamic utility\u00a0blessed with power and agility and\u00a0capable of playing\u00a0up forward\u00a0and through the midfield.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Hannaford\u2019s debut comes following a standout VFL performance in the club\u2019s round one VFL win over the Saints last week, with the\u00a019-year-old registering career-highs in both disposals and goals to finish with an eye-catching stat line of 31 disposals and 3.2 in a brilliant display across half forward.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Hannaford has been pressing for an AFL debut for the past 12\u00a0months\u00a0but\u00a0a number of\u00a0untimely injuries had continued to further delay the exciting youngster\u2019s AFL dreams.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now fully fit after a clean run with injury over the summer, Hannaford will realise his AFL dreams under the\u00a0bright\u00a0lights of Friday night footy in a huge clash with the Pies at Marvel Stadium.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Hannaford\u00a0was informed of his upcoming AFL debut at the club on Wednesday\u00a0by teammate Brent Daniels.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m\u00a0really excited\u00a0and\u00a0very happy\u00a0to be playing AFL.\u00a0It\u2019s\u00a0a dream come true,\u201d Hannaford said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve\u00a0played footy since I was three years\u00a0old\u00a0so\u00a0its\u00a0always been the goal for\u00a0me.\u00a0So\u00a0to finally live it out is\u00a0pretty exciting.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The exciting teenager admitted the thought of a potential debut had been on his mind throughout the week following last week\u2019s strong VFL performance.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI tried to put it to the back of my mind a little bit but\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0always there lingering.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u00a0didn\u2019t\u00a0want to think about it too much as it would stress me out but\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0pretty nice\u00a0to now\u00a0know\u00a0and\u00a0to\u00a0put my mind at ease.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m\u00a0pumped.\u00a0It\u2019s\u00a0a dream come true.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Hailing from Sandhurst in Bendigo, Hannaford was drafted by the GIANTS in the first round of the 2024 Draft after impressing for the GWV Rebels in the Coates Talent League as well as for the Oakleigh Chargers and Vic Country. \u00a0<\/p>\n
He\u2019ll\u00a0now get his opportunity to\u00a0showcase\u00a0his talents at AFL level in Friday\u2019s big clash at Marvel\u00a0Stadium.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Hannaford\u00a0becomes the\u00a0GIANTS\u2019\u00a0second debutant\u00a0this season\u00a0following the Opening Round debut of lively small forward Phoenix Gothard.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Friday\u2019s\u00a0blockbuster clash with the Pies will get under from 7:40pm\u00a0at\u00a0Marvel Stadium.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The GIANTS will unearth a debutant on the grand stage of Friday night footy. The GIANTS will unearth…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":562886,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85,83],"class_list":["post-562885","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\/562885","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=562885"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/562885\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/562886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=562885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=562885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=562885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}