Jeremy McGovern: Former West Coast teammate Mark LeCras on how he got up for 2018 grand final victory

The day that defines Jeremy McGovern’s remarkable career came less than 24 hours before his crowning moment. McGovern will go down as a premiership hero for West Coast, but the story of how it almost didn’t happen is a part of Eagles’ folklore. And nearly seven years on, a premiership teammate has revealed the extent to which they went to get their superstar defender on the park despite battling serious injury. McGovern had nine marks in the thrilling 2018 grand final victory against Collingwood, but none more important than his final-quarter clunk that set up that Dom Sheed goal which delivered the Eagles their fourth flag. It was a sequence that has been replayed countless times and will forever be linked to McGovern. Yet McGovern’s story leading into the game is the stuff of a Hollywood movie. He hadn’t trained all week in the lead up to the decider after he sustained a badly corked hip in the preliminary final win over Melbourne. The then 26-year-old had torn muscles off his hip and had internal bleeding as a result of the knock from future Demons star Christian Petracca. He spent the night after the win over Melbourne on a morphine drip and needed six injections on the day of the decider just to get through the game. McGovern was no certainty to play until the eve of the game when he took part in the club’s captain’s run. In the wake of McGovern’s retirement, former teammate Mark LeCras revealed to The West Australian the extent to which they went to as to ensure the star defender would play. “We knew how bad it was when he didn’t rock up for the grand final parade and the club tried to hold him back from that,” LeCras said. “I think there was a phone call with the AFL, and he was back at the hotel. We were about to do the parade, and it was like, ‘If Gov doesn’t rock up for this parade, he’s not playing’. “We then went straight to our training session the day before the grand final that was after the parade and as players, we were desperate for him to play. “I remember running around going ‘How good’s Gov looking?!’, trying to talk him up to the coaches. Saying ‘He looks a million bucks, that’s enough get him off the track’. “He was hurting, he was battling, you could tell so for him to get up and have the impact that he did was massive.” McGovern’s journey to become one of the modern-day great defenders was rocky, however. The man himself admits he was a “fat kid from Albany” when he arrived at the powerhouse club. LeCras said while it took a while for McGovern to work out what was required to make it at the AFL level, an untold story details the confidence McGovern always had in his skills to make it. So much so that the cheeky young teammate was happy to tell the superstar small forward how much better he was going to be at the end of his career than LeCras. “He was playing reserves in the WAFL at Claremont and after training we were doing goalkicking together. I remember there was a bit of back-and-forth banter going on and he was so confident in himself that he said ‘I’m going to end up kicking more goals than you’,” LeCras said. “It just absolutely baffled me and blew me away that he thought that. My reply was ‘are we including country footy here?’, just thinking ‘you’re not going to even play AFL’. “Sure, he didn’t kick more goals than me, but he turned himself into a five-time All-Australian, club champion and a massive part of a premiership that we played together. “I didn’t even think he was going to make it at that stage, it was just a bit of fun with one of the young kids. “He had that underlying confidence that he knew in his own ability that he was good enough. At that stage he was a bit ahead of himself.” McGovern didn’t play a game for the Eagles in his first three seasons on the list and was famously banished from the club in 2013 because of fitness issues. “Just physically in his first couple of years he was just a long way behind. He had raw ability, and he had talent, but his body hadn’t caught up to his mindset yet,” LeCras said. “We quickly learned he had one of the best set of hands of anyone that walked through the doors at West Coast and his old man (Andrew) playing at the highest level, you can’t undervalue that as well. “He was just super raw but when he did come good, he came good really quickly. “Gov had the confidence and the mindset it was just understanding the disciplines it took around to getting your body right for the AFL. Once he was able to do that, get a bit fitter, a little bit stronger and deal with injuries he was unstoppable.” McGovern would debut in 2014 as a forward, but quickly made his mark as an intercept defender. The next year, he was in the All-Australian squad. The change of position would help define an era at the Eagles, where he would claim four consecutive All-Australians from 2016 to 2019 and the flag as a pivotal part of the incredible side. “I remember how quickly he had an impact,” LeCras said on the move to defence. “He played his best footy being able to read the ball and also his decision making, his ball use across half-back – he was so brave with his kicks. “That comes down to the same thing, that confidence when he did that goal kicking session, he would back himself in 100 per cent and when it all started coming together for him was when he just grew as a player.”