Six GIANTS players will head to Western Australia next week for a week-long Indigenous All-Stars Camp.
 
Nearly all of the AFL’s 72 Indigenous players will convene in Perth from February 16 with the camp culminating in a match against the West Coast Eagles at Medibank Stadium in Perth on February 20.
 
Curtly Hampton, Nathan Wilson, Zac Williams, Jarrod Pickett, Paul Ahern and Jeremy Finlayson will all travel west to be part of the camp. For fourth-year defender Curtly Hampton, it will be his third camp since entering the AFL.
 
“It’s really exciting. It’s my third since I’ve been in the AFL ... It’s good that the first-year boys like Paul Ahern and Jarrod Pickett get to experience it as well and Nathan Wilson’s never been to one so I’m really excited,” Hampton said.
 
“It’s a good chance to get to know the other boys who I’ve never met before so you room up usually with someone you don’t know and you get to know them over the five days or so.
 
“A lot of the other players you idolised as kids or you play against them during the year and then you get to play with them, it’s a really good experience.
 
“We do a lot of community visits so a lot of clinics just in the local communities and we do a bit of training as well obviously to keep fit and then as a bonus, we get to play together at the end of the week which is always something we look forward to.”
 
For 18-year-old draftee Jarrod Pickett it’s an exciting opportunity he’s looking forward to, having grown up idolising many of the players attending the camp.
 
“I’m a bit excited for it, just to see all the other Indigenous players and my role models, so hopefully Goodesy (Adam Goodes) is there, Shaun Burgoyne, players like that.
 
“Shaun, he played with Byron Pickett as well, so we used to watch Port Adelaide and I used to just watch all the Indigenous players. I’m looking forward to meeting Goodesy, he’s been one of my main role models, I think he’s a main role model for a lot of Indigenous boys.”
 
Pickett has now been at the club for almost two months and and said having players like Hampton to look up to has been a huge help in settling in to his new city.
 
“It’s a lot easier knowing that all these boys are young,” he said.
 
“They’ve been in the same position as us only last year and stuff so it’s also good to have those Indigenous boys there as well just to talk to and make you feel at home.”
 
21-year-old Hampton, part of the GIANTS’ Emerging Leaders Group, said he had naturally taken a mentoring role with the new Indigenous players at the club.
 
“It’s something I was really looking forward to when I found out we had a few more boys. I’ve taken on a bit of a mentoring role, just showing them what’s needed to play at AFL level.
 
“Hopefully we can keep getting a few more over the next few years because we really stick together and we really want more at the club because all the boys love us and it’s a really good club to be around.”