“It’s all well and good to run, but you need to know where to run and how to run.”
One line from Josh Drummond explains much of what has made Sam Gibson the footballer he is today.
Set to break North Melbourne’s consecutive games record on Friday night with his 120th in a row, surpassing Keith Greig, Gibson has been a vital part of the side ever since his debut halfway through 2012.
It’s been playing a role which has often been overlooked for its importance to the setup of the midfield.
“He plays the wing role, which sounds simple in theory but is a very specific role,” Drummond, North’s midfield coach, explained.
Being able to complement the likes of Jack Ziebell, Ben Cunnington and co gives the midfield a balance on both the inside and outside.
“Inside midfielders generally hunt the footy a lot more, but the ability to hold your width and shape around the contest is crucial,” Drummond said.
“You can all be bees to a honeypot, but Gibbo is elite with his running and his work rate is unrivalled.
“That wing role is vastly different to the role of an inside midfielder.
“The reason Gibbo has played for us for as long as he has is because of his ability to play that role, play consistently, and we really value his run and ability to do that.”
The unrivalled work rate Drummond highlighted comes to the fore late in games.
No North midfielder has played as many minutes as Gibson this season. Only defenders Robbie Tarrant, Lachlan Hansen, Jamie Macmillan and forward Ben Brown are ahead of the 31-year-old.
This then allows more rotations for the remaining midfielders, allowing them to stay fresher for longer and have more impact later in the game.
“He’s got elite attributes with his running capability and his ability to run the patterns in a very specific role,” Drummond said.
“The guys he plays on are good runners as well, guys like Isaac Smith, Brad Hill; generally the guys who play on a wing are guys who can really get up and down and across the ground.
“It’s about playing your role, and Gibbo’s great strength is his run, work rate and also and that’s what he does really well on the wing.
“We really value that and there’s parts of his game he’s been working on to be able to have even more of an impact.
“In particular on the scoreboard, which he did last year and he’s still got improvement in his game, which is good for someone who’s played a lot of footy.”
Gibson’s work rate has also proved valuable on the occasions where he’s been asked to play in a defensive role.
During the 2015 finals series he was tasked with stopping the opposition’s premiere outside runner, but in recent times he’s been asked to move more inside.
Playing as an inside midfielder isn’t foreign to Gibson; it was where he excelled at VFL level before being drafted by North.
Unsurprisingly it’s an area Drummond admits the number 43 ‘would love to play a bit more’.
“You do have more opportunities to get involved in and around the contest where the ball spills,” he added,
“He’s played roles there in the last few years and times when we’ve thrown him inside he’s done really well. It’s just around getting the balance of our midfield right and for the most part that’s him on the outside.
“But when he has a job like (Rory) Sloane, who has a really high work rate as well, he fit that beautifully and then it’s about other guys adapting.
“He can certainly play inside, and I’m sure he’d like to more than he does at times but he does play that role really well for us and it’s really valued.”
As Gibson prepares for another important clash against St Kilda – a team he’s never lost to – he’ll again go about his role with a minimum of fuss, putting his teammates in the best position to succeed.
