GWS recruit Sam Jacobs is much happier bouncing ideas off Shane Mumford rather than bouncing off him.
After nine seasons at Adelaide, Jacobs is set to play his first minutes for the Giants in their opening pre-season game against Sydney on Saturday.
The 33-year-old Mumford and 31-year-old Jacobs have racked up 22 seasons and almost 400 games between them.
Perennial rivals, they are finally teammates.
“It’s been unreal, obviously as a guy coming up I’ve got a lot of respect for,” said Jacobs.
‘We’ve played a lot of footy against each other and being able to work with him one-on-one has been really enjoyable.
“I think we’ve got different strengths so we’ve been able to bounce off each other and then see what each other do.”
Jacobs has had to bang bodies with the notoriously physical Mumford on several occasions over the years .
“I’m happy to be on this side of the fence this time, happy to be his teammate, he’s an absolute competitor – No.1,” Jacobs said.
‘You know when you’re going to play Mummy he’s going to make you earn it.
“That’s something that I’ve tried to sort of take from him is his thought process round stoppage.
“He’s been able to have a really big impact around there and the way he trains is the way he plays, so it’s another learning as well.”
While most clubs in recent times have played just one ruckman for most games, Jacobs pointed out Richmond and West Coast each fielded two in their respective grand-final wins in 2018 and 2019.
He was also aware GWS played Mumford and Dawson Simpson in the same team for a few games last year.
“Providing we’re able to compete and play a role up forward there’s no reason why we can’t go to that (playing two ruckmen)at some stage or towards the back end of the year,” Jacobs said..
GWS are coming off a grand-final loss, something Jacobs had to endure after Adelaide lost the 2017 season decider.
“Individually there’s learnings from when we (Adelaide) did it, but it’s probably been a bit different up here and I’ve actually really enjoyed the process of what they’ve been able to do,” Jacobs said.
“I reckon off-field coming in we’ve done it really well so everyone is in a really good head space.”
