The thoughts still run through Jack Martin’s mind nearly every time he laces his boots. Sometimes, it’s as simple as, “Can I get through this game?” If he does, the next question inevitably follows—”Am I going to pull up OK?” At his lowest points, even trotting out to training has begged the thought, “Will I finish this session?”
Martin’s fitness had failed him towards the end of a five-year Carlton career that yielded just 54 senior games. More than that, his mind had started playing tricks on him as well. While he was always confident he could get back to being the player he had long promised to be, he needed to find an environment that could cater to a body that was fast becoming unreliable. He’s found that at Geelong.
“To be honest, I don’t even know how to explain it,” Martin tells AFL.com.au on the eve of his long-awaited return to September. “It’s a funny one, because half the battle for me has been the mental game. It’s between the ears. I haven’t played a lot of footy over the last couple of years. Even now, during the week at training, I’ll ask, ‘Am I going to get through this?’ I’m sort of still facing those challenges.”
A New Beginning at Geelong
Finally, Martin feels like his body is starting to feel normal again. He describes it as being in “a good place.” But it’s taken a lot to get here—a lot of planning, a lot of trust, and, most importantly, a lot of time. That time is best measured in months, rather than weeks or days or hours.
The story of Martin’s season dates back to late last year when he first met with Cats coach Chris Scott and the club’s football boss Andrew Mackie about the prospect of a move. At the time, with his days at Carlton numbered, Geelong was attempting to lure the forward down the highway, as opposed to across the country and back to his home state of Western Australia, where Fremantle had also shown interest.
The Geelong list management team ultimately swayed the 30-year-old with a carefully curated and meticulously designed plan to get his body back to peak condition. It was one laid out by science and medicine consultant Steve Saunders, high-performance manager Des O’Sullivan, and physiotherapist Richard Citroen, backed by Scott and Mackie, and requiring the full buy-in of Martin himself.
“As much as we’ve got this finals series to play out, I’m really excited and optimistic about another pre-season and what next season holds and beyond that as well,” Martin says.
The Road to Recovery
The detailed Geelong plan that was presented to Martin unfolded across the first half of this season. It started with the veteran playing only a half of a VFL practice game against Port Melbourne in February. He was scheduled to play another half for the VFL side against Essendon the following week but pulled out due to some calf tightness in the lead-up. He wasn’t seen again, at any level, for three months.
But that was all part of the equation. As speculation in certain quarters swirled around whether another significant soft-tissue injury was keeping Martin sidelined, that wasn’t the case. Instead, behind the scenes and away from prying eyes, he was completing a lengthy block of conditioning work, re-training his body—and his mind—to handle the rigors of a full season of football.
Such was the typically successful start to Geelong’s campaign—which helped result in a 15th top-four berth from the past 19 seasons—the club could preach patience with Martin. The Cats took a no-risk, flexible, and modified approach to his training loads, enabling him to take certain planned days off to manage his conditioning.
“To be honest, it was more out of my hands,” Martin says of Geelong’s detailed fitness plan. “I left it to the high-performance and the medical team. I just trusted their process.”
Impact and Future Prospects
Martin’s impact on Geelong’s fortunes through the second half of the season has been obvious. A big driver in the club’s decision to chase him towards the end of last season was his positional flexibility, and since returning to the park, he has indeed flourished at both ends of the field.
Having kickstarted his return in a long-forgotten role across half-back, resulting in a 21-disposal performance against Brisbane and a 25-disposal effort against Richmond to emphasize both his newfound sense of fitness and form, he’s since moved forward again and been just as influential.
He has kicked nine goals from his past five games—including a day out against Port Adelaide, where he was activated from the substitute’s bench and kicked four goals in his first five minutes on the ground—making him feel primed for September.
“I’m just enjoying it and enjoying every day,” Martin says. “Especially with having a young family, bringing the kids along to the game and just making it an experience for them as well. I haven’t played a lot of finals in the past, so I’m excited.”
Martin is a player built for the big stage. It should be of no surprise that perhaps his two best games for Carlton came late in 2023, when he kicked two goals each in both the side’s elimination final win over Sydney and its preliminary final loss to Brisbane.
There, he showed the toughness, aggression, x-factor, skill, and flare that he was once recognized for. All have returned to his game across 2025, and all are key ingredients come September. But perhaps more importantly, the fun factor is back as well.
While he is by no means letting any complacency seep in—the doubts that occasionally creep into his mind are a constant reminder of his past—he is finally, and deservedly, enjoying his football again.
