Try telling that to Jackson Paine, Collingwood’s first selection (No. 50 overall) in the 2011 National Draft.
Watch Jackson Paine host the first day of his video diary from the club's first-year training camp in Tasmania on YouTube.
“There are challenges when you feel like you’re out of your depth,” Paine admitted to collingwoodfc.com.au this week.
“When you’ve got the likes of (Dane) Swan and (Scott) Pendlebury running around and hitting their targets, you feel like questioning whether you should be there, but I think that there’s enough support around the group and the group’s pretty close so everyone feels like they belong.”
Paine recently returned from a three-night training camp in Tasmania for the club’s first year players, where the group was tested both physically and mentally only weeks into their AFL journeys. He says his early taste of pre-season training has taught him several lessons about the requirements for success at the top level.
The first of these is professionalism.
“I’ve learnt a lot about professionalism and the 24/7 approach. That’s what I keep telling people as the most important thing I’ve learnt so far,” Paine explains.
“As Fly (development coach Craig McRae) put it, every decision you make concerns this job. (It involves) everything you put into your body and that you do to your body in terms of going out or anything like that, so definitely the professionalism and the 24/7 approach is the biggest thing that I’ve had to cling onto.”
For Paine, one area in which the differences between junior football and the AFL is most noticeable is during training. The levels the senior players reach can be quite an eye-opener.
“It’s definitely like nothing I’ve ever done before. It’s the intensity, and the consistency of the intensity, where there’s no opportunity to put your hands on your knees or get a rest in more than anything.”
“It’s the consistency of the intensity. You can play in teams where the intensity can fluctuate but here it’s just 100%.”
The 194cm forward is fortunate to be reunited with Dale Tapping, who coached Paine’s Sandringham Dragons to the TAC Cup premiership only four months ago.
“My coaching mentor is Dale Tapping. It’s pretty handy because he’s obviously come out of the TAC Cup system with the Sandringham Dragons where he was my coach, so we’ve already got a close bond together and to have him as my mentor here is very handy.
“We work well together.”
Paine played in the Dragons’ 2011 premiership side but entered the pre-season with a broken thumb. His recovery has been uninterrupted, and he is in full training along with the other senior players.
“I haven’t had any issues with it (his thumb). I’m very happy with my thumb, it’s recovered perfectly. I’m in full training now, with full contact and all that.”
He’s now focusing firmly on the season to come and refuses to get ahead too far ahead of himself.
“I had a good chat with Bucks this time last week, and we worked out what I want to do.
“I know it’s clichéd, but you really work out the merit of using that week-by-week process. It really does take that week by week, stage by stage process.
