Suggestions Geelong skipper Patrick Dangerfield could be lured back to Adelaide at the end of 2024 have been shut down.
It was reported by Seven's Mitch Cleary that the 2022 premiership star, who left the Crows at the end of 2015 to join the Cats and move back to his home town of Moggs Creek on the Great Ocean Road, was approached by his former club to consider a move back to where it all began.
Since moving to Geelong, Dangerfield has won a Brownlow medal (2016), collected five of his eight All-Australian blazers and played a crucial role in the Cats' 81-point grand final win over Sydney.
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The Crows made a bid to lure Dangerfield back to the club that drafted him back in 2007.
But the discussions have turned out to be not as serious as first believed.
A conversation between the 34-year-old midfielder and an Adelaide representative reportedly took place at the beginning of 2024, according to the Herald Sun.
The call was laughed off, despite Dangerfield becoming a free agent at season's end.
Dangerfield has been spending more time in Adelaide as he continues to work through a plethora of soft tissue injuries from the past few seasons.
It's where Cats physio Steve Saunders is based, who works closely with the veteran.
It comes as he continues his time in rehab, after he suffered a second hamstring injury in a matter of weeks.
During Geelong's 13-point win against Carlton in round seven, Dangerfield was chasing a loose footy in the third term when he grabbed hold of the ball as he fell to the ground.
He handballed it on, but after getting up, looked extremely ginger on his leg.
Back in February, Dangerfield outlined the changes Geelong had made to their pre season training program on his podcast.
"We've changed from three main sessions a week, to two main sessions," he said on his podcast Reel Adventures.
"The reason for that is that we've really increased our high speed. We've changed. Personally, I've gone from 450-odd metres in terms of high speed. High speed is above 24 kilometres an hour.
"The reason behind it is to try and bullet-proof hamstrings, so by the time you hit games, it should feel like games are almost the de-load."
His comments were slammed by Kane Cornes, who expressed his concerns around the large load increase for the ageing star.
The hamstring injury is his second this season, after hurting it earlier in the year against former side, Adelaide.
"That's such a big increase in high speed and load," he said on Nine's Sunday Footy Show.
"I wonder, for Dangerfield, at his age, whether Geelong reflect now and go, 'did we get that program wrong'?"
Geelong suffered their first loss of 2024 at the hands of Melbourne in round eight, going down by eight points.
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