Retired David Wojcinski (1999-2012)

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May 11, 2006
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David Wojcinski


Fast Facts

Jumper No: 40
Height: 180 cm
Weight: 80 kg
DOB: 18 September 1980


Outlook
Was the unlucky player of the Cats’ finals campaign when the club had to make a big call over selection. An Achilles problem sidelined him between rounds 16-20 and although the speedster returned for the preliminary final, someone had to make way for Paul Chapman. Wojcinski drew the short straw and, if anything, it highlighted the club’s tremendous depth. Is a quality player and is sure to prove is worth in 2009.

SEASON BY SEASON HIGHLIGHTS

2008
# Achilles injury ruined second half of season
# Played 13 of first 15 rounds but only one game after that
# Came back in for preliminary final and had 18 possessions and kicked a crucial early goal
# Was the unlucky player to make way for Paul Chapman on grand final day
# Equaled a career high with 23 possessions in rd 14 vs. Adelaide
# Had double digit possessions in 13 of 14 games, and exceeded 20 on three occasions
# Shared community champion award with Harley & Kelly for contribution to Just Think campaign

2007
# Key member of drought breaking premiership team
# Was an ever present, playing all 25 games
# Set career highs with 381 possessions and 14 goals
# Played his 100th game in rd 7, a 39 point win over West Coast
# Had double figure possessions in 23 of 25 matches

2006
# Came back from knee reconstruction to play 15 games
# Best game came in rd 13 vs. Crows with 19 possessions

2005
# Played two games before rupturing ACL in rd 2 clash with Eagles in Perth
# Had great start with 21 possessions in rd 1 win over Richmond

2004
# Played 21 games including all three finals
# Named as Cats most improved player
# Had first ever 20 disposal game, rd 12 vs. Nth Melb, finishing with 23 possessions, which remains an equal career high
# Had two other games with 20 + disposals

2003
# A regular for second straight year, playing 18 games
# 50th AFL game came in Canberra against Nth Melb in rd 17
# Kicked two goals in 50th match, his first multi goal game

2002
# Break through season, playing 17 games
# Finished 16th in best & fairest

2001
# Played six AFL games for season

2000
# Played nine senior games
# Made finals debut in elimination final against Hawthorn

1999
# Made AFL debut against Port Adelaide in rd 4 at AAMI Stadium
# Kicked his first goal on debut
# Played five AFL games

1998
# Played for Vic Country in U18 national championship
# Played with Gippsland Power in TAC Cup
# Played with Geelong reserves as ‘top up’ player
 

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Re: No. 40 David Wojcinski

Awards

Geelong
Most improved player 2004
Community champion 2008

Representative honors
Victoria Country U18 1998

Premierships
AFL 2007 (Geelong dft Port Adelaide)
 
Re: No. 40 David Wojcinski

Wojcinski the Geelong express
09 June 2007 Herald-Sun
Scott Gullan

EXACTLY how fast David Wojcinski can run remains a mystery. The only time the AFL's version of Asafa Powell has been clocked for 100m was a disaster.
Johnson fuels Cat revival

"I have been timed with a stopwatch once," the Cats defender recalled this week. "I had just got back from a broken leg two weeks earlier and I ran a pathetic time at a school sports meet.

"I ran in the 100m sprint at the Grand Final three or four years ago but the ground was heavy and I slipped at the start so that was also no good."

It is no secret that Wojcinski is fast but never before has his speed had such an impact. This year he and the Cats are living the motto: "Speed kills and thrills."

One opposition coach this week even went as far as to say he holds the key to Geelong's premiership aspirations.

"A lot of people would say Gary Ablett, Paul Chapman or a Cameron Mooney are the keys down there, but without Wojcinski it all breaks down," he said. "I'm telling you he is crucial to the way they play, he's a 60m player who breaks lines and that is like gold in today's game."

To be precise, Wojcinski is actually a 44.6m player according to Champion Data statistics. That's the average metres gained by Geelong from one of his possessions and it ranks No. 2 in the competition behind the Bulldogs' Ryan Griffen.

He is also No. 2 for running bounces and is averaging a career-high 18 disposals a match, hitting a target an impressive 85.4 per cent of the time.

The stats also show that Wojcinski has been crucial in straightening the Cats up this season, with 58 per cent of his midfield possessions through the corridor. The competition average is just 33 per cent.

A couple of hapless Saints in Nick Dal Santo and Shane Birss witnessed first-hand at Telstra Dome on Sunday exactly what Wojcinski can do when he switches on the after-burners.

At the 20-minute mark of the first quarter, Wojcinski received a handball from Cameron Ling on the wing and then, with total contempt for his St Kilda opponents, took them on, had two bounces and kicked the goal from 50m.

"I saw a bit of an opening and just went for it," he said. "Lingy was actually yelling at me to take them on so I figured I might.

"I have always been told to get the ball and just run, even from an early age. All I have ever been told is to get it and run with it, don't hog it, but just get it and go and take them on.

"People say you can hurt opposition teams and it really sparks your side so just do it."

The origins of the speed are a bit of a mystery although his father, Charlie, claimed he showed a bit of toe as a player.

"Dad reckons he was pretty quick when he was young and he used to crack jokes about it," Wojcinski said. "I can't remember him playing footy but I'm told he was pretty quick so I suppose that is where I get it from."

Growing up in the small Gippsland town of Heyfield - his parents used to run the local post office - Wojcinski was your typical country kid who played footy in the winter and cricket in the summer.

He progressed to the TAC Cup with Gippsland Power and played for Vic Country in the national championships which ensured he was on the recruiters' radar.

A broken leg midway through his second season in the under-18s had him worried that he might be overlooked, although his concerns were eased when then-Richmond coach Jeff Gieschen, who hailed from down the road at Maffra and had played with his dad, called in to see him leading up to the 1998 draft.

He told Wojcinski the Tigers would take him with their first pick (No. 40) if he was still around. He wasn't, with the Cats snaring him at No. 24 and James White (four career games) going to Punt Rd.

But looking back it was almost like he was meant to be a Cat. The person who broke his leg that year was a Geelong Falcon by the name of Cameron Ling plus he had filled in as a top-up player for the Geelong reserves earlier in the season and played alongside future teammates Steven King and Darren Milburn.

Earlier that year he had lined up in the blue and white hoops on the MCG against Melbourne. "I kicked a goal and was rapt," he said. "I also got to keep my shorts and socks which was great."

Maybe it's the youthful face, the bounce in his step or a look at his games-played stat which makes you think he's younger than his 26 years. "This is my ninth year and I think that surprises a lot of people," he said. "I'm probably fifth or sixth oldest down here."

Wojcinski finally played his 100th game in Round 7 against West Coast with the milestone met with a big sigh of relief.

"It was something I wanted to get out of the way," he said. "You see blokes my age who are playing 150-160 games and I am just getting to 100. I haven't done it real easy."

To be specific, it was Round 2, 2005 when Wojcinski's career suddenly got a whole lot harder. A regulation dash through the middle of Subiaco went horribly wrong when he went to change direction to evade an Eagle and his right knee buckled.

A full knee reconstruction was required and it has taken him two years to regain his confidence and play with the freedom which makes him the Cats' lethal weapon.

Wojcinski admits there were times when he thought he may never get back to being the player he was. "I had my doubts and last year was a very hard year," he said.

He was dropped three times and managed just 15 games as he battled his mental and physical demons.

"I missed out on the pre-season, I was running and stuff but it was all straight-line running and not football running," he said. "I just couldn't run out games, I would go for one run up the ground and I would be buggered for 10 or 15 minutes afterwards.

"I wasn't trying to cut too hard or try to take on the impossible. As the year went on I got better but it took me a few goes to get used to it again. I think once I got back to Subiaco (Round 12) and played a game over there and actually played all right it sort of erased all the doubts.

"I don't even think about it now. It really feels like I have got my leg back."

During his enforced layoff in 2005 Wojcinski - the name is Polish - headed to Europe for six weeks, visiting his father's cousins in Germany and then travelling through Greece, France and Italy.

"It helped me so much," he said. "I was still checking the internet every week to see how the boys went but it was so good to get away and it made the time out of the game go quicker."

Last year he got another chance to head back there following the Cats' end-of-season game against Port Adelaide in London but this time it was very different because he wanted to get home as quickly as possible.

Wojcinski and his long-time partner Casey had become the proud parents of a baby boy, Alfie, on Grand Final eve, making him just the third father at the club. (Cameron Mooney became No. 4 on Thursday with a baby boy, Jagger).

"It's awesome," he beams. "I just can't wait to get home and play with him. If you have had a bad day at training or something like that then you go home and he has always got a smile on his face."

Much like his football team, Wojcinski is enjoying life at the moment, which is something that couldn't be said about both last year.

While he has a cruisy personality - he often sits in his backyard and watches the stars - and is much loved by everyone down at Skilled Stadium for being a genuine good bloke, there is a seriousness to his tone when discussing where the Cats are heading this season.

"You get that feeling that everyone is expecting us to fall over again but we are pretty determined not to let it happen," he said.

"Hopefully this is it, we have changed it and from now on the new blokes coming in don't get exposed to that up and down form and the mentality of the place.

"Hopefully we can carry on forward in a good way."

At lightning speed, of course.
Click to expand...

http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/footy/common/story_page/0,8033,21873501%5E19742,00.html
 
Re: No. 40 David Wojcinski

AFL Round 11 v Adelaide
Kept quiet today, didn't get the chance to run the lines like usual due to Adelaide's floods down the corridor.
 
Re: No. 40 David Wojcinski

One of our best, this bloke!
Can we get a correct phonetic pronunciation of his name - they butchered it on the commentaries and frequently do. Is it 'Woi-chinski'? I'm told it's not 'Wodg-inski' which I've always called him. Most go for 'Monica' - hard to get wrong. One of you blokes with the Polish signatures can tell us. Then tell the media.
 
Re: No. 40 David Wojcinski

The pain of GF omission spurs David Wojcinski

Herald Sun | Jackie Epstein | January 11, 2009 12:00am

GEELONG defender David Wojcinski has pledged to fight back from his Grand Final heartbreak by playing his best football this season.

Dumped after last year's preliminary final, the 28-year-old admits he was hurt and angry after his axing.

Wojcinski said he was determined to channel that disappointment into a positive.

"I was pretty angry I didn't get to play," he said yesterday.

"I thought I played all right in the prelim, but it's their call. All I can do is go out there and play as good I can. I thought I did that.

"It's over now. That was last year and I'm more than happy to be back at the club again this year and putting in a big pre-season.

"We've got such a good side and, hopefully, we can be up there again and really test every other team out there and win another premiership.

"If anything I'm going to put (the hurt) towards going out there and playing some good footy this year.

"It's always going to hurt, missing out on a Grand Final. You never know if you could have helped the team or not. I don't know if I would have been the difference or anything, but you just never know.

"I'm just really looking forward to the season starting, to play that first game and get it over and done with."

Wojcinski is still recovering from an achilles injury that restricted to him to 14 games last season.

He was the first Cat across the line in yesterday's Pier to Pub swim at Lorne and hopes to start running this week with the view to playing in Round 1.

"I missed pretty much half the year and battled through the second half of the year with that injury and that was a big part of the reason I missed the Grand Final," he said.

"It's still a little bit sore but, hopefully, in the next couple of weeks I can ramp it up and join in the skills."

Wojcinski married on October 18 in Port Douglas, which proved a timely distraction.

"I got married over the holidays which took my mind off footy a lot. It came at the perfect time," he said.

"To get away when I was a little bit angry and a little bit not thinking straight. It was good to get away and go up to Port Douglas and get married up there."

His father, Charlie, had criticised the club during Grand Final week for leaving his son out.

"It was just a big disappointment the whole day," Wojcinski said.

"Myself missing out and then the boys missing out. It just wasn't a good day.

"I've had an amazing amount of people saying that I should have been in the side, but there are people who are in the job to make those decisions.

"I still get people coming up to me now saying I was unlucky, but I say, 'oh well that was last year mate'."
 
Re: No. 40 David Wojcinski

VFL Practice Match 7/3/9......special comments by Shake and Bake

David Wojcinski - wore number 35. just got through the game ok thats all i can really say although he didnt play the last quarter but i think they would of planned that, he was pretty much playing the 1st 7 or 8 mins of each quarter and then coming off for 5 and then running the quarter out for 3 quarters, didnt do much but he did get through ok.

From The Addy
VFL: David Wojcinski back and aiming for round one

Nick wade

March 9th, 2009

GEELONG dasher David Wojcinski made a flying return to football but scholarship rookie Ranga Ediriwickrama appears set to be sidelined for a while through injury.

That was the mixed report card from the VFL Cats' 60-point thumping of Williamstown in a practice match at Skilled Stadium on Saturday.

Wojcinski, playing his first match of the year after a conservative approach following achilles tendon surgery, played three quarters and burned around the track with his usual running flare.

VFL coach Dale Amos said the club was happy with Wojcinski's comeback match and said he was firming to be ready to go for the round one clash with Hawthorn.

"He did everything he needed to do (on Saturday), he got through the game and pulled up really well (on Saturday) night, it was a big step forward for him and he's ready to go I think," Amos said.

He'll look to play more footy next week and give himself a good opportunity to be ready to play round one. He did everything right."
Click to expand...
 

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