Euroa talisman Will Hayes has not been an ever-present force in the Goulburn Valley League — his calendar can tend to get a little busy sometimes — but when he’s around, you certainly take note.
Saturday’s outing against Seymour at Euroa’s Memorial Oval served as a reminder to the competition that Hayes has more than enough in the bag to keep a game firmly on his side’s terms.
Will Hayes runs the show - stats v Seymour
Disposals: 39
Contested possessions: 16
Inside 50s: 7
Total ground ball gets: 10
Goal involvements: 5
Hayes was at his superb best once more, accumulating a massive 173 ranking points for his efforts.
With the exception of the contested ball, where Seymour’s Tom Maloney stood above the rest, Hayes led all comers as either top or joint-top in each of those categories.
A frontrunner for last season’s Morrison Medal, Hayes took the game by the scruff of its neck from the word go, getting stuck in with five contested touches from his 14 disposals and eventually being involved in two goal-scoring chains in the opening term.
It was Hayes’ turn to get on the score sheet with Euroa’s sole major in the second term, contributing his one goal for the day in a quarter that remarkably had the 29-year-old notch stats in every core metric of the game.
It was another double-digit disposal tally for the former AFL Bulldog and Blue after half-time, getting involved in another three scores including providing two direct goal assists as the Magpies asserted themselves.
Obviously, things were different in the final half-hour of the game as Seymour’s resilience came to the fore and the Lions’ midfield started getting plenty more of the ball in a late rally.
Just quietly, though: the above GVL Data numbers are only through the first three quarters, not even including the final term.
You read that right — Hayes assembled that output without even needing to take a down quarter into consideration, proving nothing short of pivotal as Euroa got enough credit built to weather the Seymour storm.
Hayes has only appeared in five of the Magpies’ nine games in 2024, but his averages for effective disposals, loose ball gets and handball receives are all comfortably nestled inside the league’s top 20.
Not just an outside runner, Hayes is more than willing to get down to ground level all the same — and Euroa will stand to profit immensely whenever it gets him in the jumper.
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