The Sydney Swans wouldn't have headhunted Angus Baker and Mitch Maguire if they weren't serious about putting them on the club's AFL list.
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That's the message from Swans head of development and coaching director John Blakey after the Canberra Demons duo began training with the Swans ahead of the AFL rookie draft on November 23.
Key defender and ex-Sydney academy member Baker found himself back on the Swans' radar a year after returning from an anterior cruciate ligament tear which ruined his hopes of being drafted as a teenager.
Now the 20-year-old has another chance to realise his AFL dream as he looks to stand out amongst Sydney's first to fourth year players at Moore Park before the rest of the squad returns to training.
"We wouldn’t have invited them here if we weren’t serious about them," Blakey said.
"Obviously that’s left up to [list manager] Kinnear Beatson and his crew at the end of the day, to see what falls out in the draft and what’s around with rookie spots and all of those sorts of things. Obviously they’re under our radar and we’ve got our eye on them.
"With Angus, he has obviously been through our academy and we really liked his football as he came through the academy. Unfortunately in his draft year he hurt his knee so he missed all of his draft year.
"It’s his first year back in the system and we kept and eye on him. He had a fairly good year with the Canberra Demons so it stemmed from that.
"He’s had a long association with the club, we know what sort of boy he is and what he is capable of doing. Hopefully he can reproduce that, he played some good football this year."
Maguire almost hung up the phone when the person on the other end introduced themselves as Swans list manager Beatson, assuming it was a prank from one of his Canberra teammates.
It was anything but after Maguire's breakout season saw him win the NEAFL's Rising Star award and finish fourth in the league's best and fairest voting.
The 175cm midfielder's small frame is seen as one concern about his ability to make a fist of it at AFL level but Blakey - a veteran of 359 AFL games - says Maguire doesn't look out of place.
"He’s only a little fella but bloody hell, he has a real crack and just keeps finding the footy and producing good footy," Blakey said.
"He won the Rising Star, he’s just one of those guys through pure workrate and the way he uses the ball, just catches your eye.
"He’s another one that just stood out to our boys and obviously those two have got a couple of weeks training with us prior to the draft so we can have a bit of a closer look.
"We don’t get to see them every week obviously, but we can see how they train, how their fitness levels are and how they go about things. That’s the reason we’ve got the boys here for the next couple of weeks."
Blakey says Canberra's rise from cellar-dwellers to premiership contenders with a side boasting an average age only just north of 20 will see more Demons emerge on the radar of AFL clubs.
It comes as the club signs former NBL player Luke Jamieson, who played 20 games across four seasons with the Illawarra Hawks before linking up with Mount Gambier in the SEABL this year.
Jamieson has been identified as a key forward or ruck for a Demons outfit that returned to the grind of pre-season training this week.
