Oisín Mullin arrives in Melbourne tomorrow to begin his pre-season training for AFL premiership champions Geelong Cats.
Mullin makes the move as a category B rookie, having postponed the intended switch by 12 months to give one more year to Mayo.
The two-time Young Footballer of the Year has remained in contact with the Cats however and will now link up with fellow Irishmen Zach Tuohy and Mark O’Connor.
Recruiting manager, Stephen Wells revealed that Mullin met up with some of his future teammates when they came over to Ireland recently and spoke glowingly of the Kilmaine man’s potential.
“Oisín is a good young man,” said Wells. “It just turned out last year, with a little bit of uncertainty because of the Covid in getting him out here... We were hoping he was going to be out here for the start of pre-season and it got into 2022 and January and February came around so in the end he didn’t get here.
“But he’s had another good season of Gaelic footy, he’s a good quality young man and he’s as excited about coming out as he could possibly be, perhaps even more excited after missing out a year.
“As it turned out, a lot of our players went over to Ireland after the season to watch Mark O’Connor play and also Zach Tuohy got married over there and they ran into him and perhaps that got him a bit excited about coming too.
“He’s a running player, he’s not a big fella, he’s more of a defender so he’ll come out and take however long it takes him to get a hold of a game and hopefully that’s not too long.
“He’s actually arriving tomorrow (Tuesday).”
Walsh also highlighted what scouts were attempting to identify in Gaelic footballers, that they felt could translate to Aussie rules, with the emphasis on athleticism, which is why the majority of GAA recruits tend to play at half-back.
“We love people that can run coming from Ireland. We want people to be able to run and have a natural game sense for our game. The ones that make a great success of it are normally very athletic and can learn to kick the ball quickly. Oisín’s been doing a bit of work on his kicking and we’re confident he can turn that into the right level of skill for us.
“But the run and carry, and a bit of overhead work is all important but there’s no doubt it’s still a very different game and the Irishmen normally take a little bit of time to catch up. Going over the other side of the world is hard enough and then taking up a completely different game.”
