Phoenix Spicer can pinpoint the moment he first felt the pull towards the big time.

In pouring rain at the Adelaide Oval, Crows forward Eddie Betts gathered a loose handball, pirouetted onto his left foot and hit a fadeaway torpedo from the boundary line.

It was significant for the timing: not only was it Indigenous Round (as it was known at the time), but it was the young Nunggubuyu man's first AFL game.

On Saturday afternoon, almost eight years since the champion forward first lit the fire in him, Spicer will realise his ambition during Sir Doug Nicholls Round.

The Kangaroos will wear artist Emma Bamblett's 'Connecting Through Identity,' a guernsey featuring each of the team's First Nations players' totems.

As he pulls on the historic blue and white colours and his No.36, the 21-year-old will also represent his totem, the barramundi fish.

"That'll mean a lot to me," Spicer smiled.

"I've always wanted to play in Indigenous Round. Seeing the special goals, the players dancing and celebrating … I want to be a part of that.

"Hopefully this week I'll get the opportunity to go out there and express myself."

Spicer's journey to the big stage began in Numbulwar, a remote community in east Arnhem Land.

To drop the coordinates into Google Maps is to marvel at the sheer scale of the Australian continent: his home is nearly 13 hours' drive east of Darwin.

"We did a lot of fishing up there, from early in the morning to late at night," he recalled.

"We'll be walking back (home) while the sun's going down. And then we'll have a big feed all together, back at home.

"I remember a lot of fishing, a lot of hunting out in the bush. It's a lot different to here."

It's hard for Spicer to get home, now he's a full-time footballer.

The game is among the most demanding in the world, and he has learned to avail himself of every resource to maintain fitness and stave off injuries.

"It's just hard to get back there with the two-week break after the season, because there's no facilities there. It's just so remote," he lamented.

"I want to spend more time there than just two weeks, but I'd get to spend a week at the most, get back to Darwin and train again."

When Spicer was 10 he moved west to the capital with his mum, and 12 months later he headed south to Adelaide to live with his pop.

It's enough to make anyone's head spin, but his family helped him feel grounded.

"I didn't really notice (the changes) too much," he shrugged.

"I had a big family, and as long as I was with my family I was happy where I was. I was still young. If I was older it would have been a big difference.

"It just felt normal wherever I went. I just felt at home no matter what."

Soon after he moved to the South Australian capital, Spicer's schoolmates set his life on another course.

"A couple of my mates from school told me to come out and play footy," he explained.

"I was like 'all right, I'll come'. I was the fastest at the school so they wanted me to come and play footy, I wasn't even that interested in footy, I just loved sports.

"I went out for the first night, the first training, and I just loved it … I had all my schoolmates there as well, so that's what made it more fun.

"It was that recess and lunch feeling. It felt normal."

In Spicer's early teenage years, his pop fell unwell.

He spent more time with friends, and stayed with Indigenous couple Chanel Brown and Gary Wanganeen.

"I still hang out with and call them (his friends in Adelaide). It's like a second family, they weren't family but it felt like family," he said.

"When my pop passed away I moved in with Chanel and Gary, and they helped me pretty much get to where I am right now. I'm grateful for them, for sure."

Soon after Spicer moved in with Brown and Wanganeen, they moved from the city's inner west to the outer southern suburbs.

His football had caught the interest of West Adelaide's talent-spotters, and he was invited to try out for the Bloods' U16 team.

It was a lengthy commute from his new home however, so his hosts intervened.

"They saw the email and she said 'that's too far, we'll go to South Adelaide because it's the closest'," he recited.

"She got in touch with the South Adelaide talent manager Warren (Ploenges), we had a meeting and I told them about my journey and accomplishments.

"He said 'we'll take you', and I had my first year with the Under 16s."

Spicer took some time to settle at the Panthers' home in Noarlunga, playing without his close friends for the first time in his life.

In his bottom-age year, the challenge was compounded by a broken arm.

It generated a sense of urgency in Spicer, but his worries were soon allayed.

"In my 18s year I thought 'I've got to give it my all' … next minute a couple of clubs get in contact with me," he explained.

"The first club was actually North Melbourne! I had a few meetings with them throughout the year, so I had a feeling I was coming here.

"It was crazy getting these emails, calls and messages … I didn't know how to take it at first."

North Melbourne's South Australian talent scout Brett Sclanders was among the recruiters who met with Spicer early in 2020.

"There was an element of surprise on Phoenix's part (when the club contacted him)," he remembered.

"As you'd expect throughout that process, he was a very quiet and reserved young man, very respectful … but there was a sense of underlying confidence.

"From an assessment perspective, he had qualities that were rare for 18-year-olds – to take the game on with confidence and challenge players."

Despite having broken his arm and missed a critical season, Spicer had remained on the Roos' radar.

After ex-national recruiting manager Mark Finnigan flagged his interest early in the 2019 season, Sclanders kept tabs on Spicer and produced detailed reports.

"He didn't (always) play the role that he's playing for us at North Melbourne," he outlined.

"He played a wing and high half-forward role, but when he pushed forward he really showed the small forward craft – the agility to get past players, the frenetic pace.

"He also had some really good scoreboard impact. In one game here he had five shots in a quarter, he really flashed that ability to get forward and play as a small.

"To be thrown around in three spots as an 18-year-old is tough … it's been a journey for him to get there as a small forward."

Initially forecast as a rookie selection, the Roos were aware of interest in Spicer from Collingwood among other clubs, and selected the 173cm prospect with pick 42 in the 2020 national draft.

In Melbourne he moved in with the Egglestone family, long-time supporters of the club and parents to head physio Brenton.

The Egglestones had previously hosted Lachie Hansen and Luke Davies-Uniacke.

Spicer then moved in with Tarryn Thomas for a short time before he met girlfriend Ky-ya Nicholson Ward, the Wurundjeri and Dja Dja Wurrung artist behind the club's 2022 Indigenous guernsey.

"In my first two years I struggled with injuries especially, but not having that balance away from footy," he related.

"I didn't have family to see. It was just footy, go home, and then footy the next morning. It was like that for two years.

"Once I met Ky-ya I found a good balance between footy and life away from footy.

"I've met good mates through her family, and got close with her family and her friends, so it's made it easier for me to hang out with people outside of footy and just have that balance."

Spicer initially struggled with hamstring injuries, limited to one appearance in his first season and five appearances near the finish line in his second.

A carefully constructed program has granted Spicer continuity, and he has maintained the regime as he's returned to the field.

"My body feels good, and I feel confident that it won't happen again as long as I keep listening to the medical team and preparing well," he outlined.

"We have points we have to tick off - ice baths, massages, using the roller, stretches, getting in the pool for a swim. On my days off I'll go for a 30-minute walk, not just lay around at home.

"When I first came in my professionalism wasn't as good, but I've learned a lot. I took it all in."

In time, he hopes he can get back to Numbulwar more often.

"When I was in Adelaide, I missed out on the ceremonies and dances and all the culture up there," he explained.

"I still want to go back there and learn, because it's important."

In the meantime, his connection to the Top End and his Nunggubuyu heritage is through his mum and his nine siblings, just a phone call away.

"I call her about culture. That's how I found out my totem, where I'm from and everything," he related.

"She's the first person I talk to, and then she'll pass the phone around to everyone to talk about how life and footy's going.

"It's really good to have them supporting me with all this, being so far away from home."