Cam Fleeton has made sure to tap into his most valuable resource in his first few months as a GIANT: his teammates in the backline.

Fleeton only started playing in defence a couple of years ago, and was known at the Geelong Falcons for coming to the coaches each week asking to play on the opposition team’s best forward.

The teenager – the second-last player picked in last December’s national draft – has tested himself against Harry Himmelberg, Jeremy Finlayson, Jake Riccardi and Jesse Hogan during training sessions, while picking up as much as possible from his fellow defenders both on the track and off.

Fleeton chats about his first AFL pre-season, his cancelled 2020 season and his first few months in Sydney on the final episode of the Becoming GIANT podcast for season two.

“I’ve been really lucky. The backline group is awesome, everyone’s really supportive,” he said.

“I’ve been doing a fair bit of vision and stuff with Lachie Keeffe, and Lachie Ash has been helping me out a lot as well, him being a second-year player and being pretty new at the club.

“Same as Phil Davis - he’s been awesome - but all of the backs are just great and I’m really lucky to be part of the backline group.

“There’s a lot more very specific stuff and stuff I definitely would not have picked up on before I was at the club, so it’s been great.

“It keeps me really focussed and there’s so much to learn. It’s just really good having that to take in and learn from and improve on.”

Fleeton hoped he was going to be drafted last December, but by the time clubs started to pass on picks late in the night was telling himself he would have to wait for the rookie draft the next day.

He was in bed, almost asleep, when his name was announced at pick 58.

“I thought the draft was over because everyone started passing. I went to bed and was pretty confident I’d be a fair chance to get picked up in the rookie draft,” he said.

“I was ok with that so I went to bed, then got a phone call from my manager. I can’t even remember what he said, but I didn’t really understand what he said.

“I wasn’t really thinking about anything at that stage, then my phone started blowing up a bit and I figured it out.

“It all worked out in the end so I was very stoked about it.”