63 Facts About Adam Goodes

1.

Adam Goodes' father is of English, Irish and Scottish ancestry; his mother is an Aboriginal Australian, and is one of the Stolen Generation.

2.

Adam Goodes' parents were separated when he was four; his father moved to Mackay, Queensland while Adam Goodes moved between Wallaroo and Adelaide and Merbein with his mother.

3.

Adam Goodes preferred soccer as a boy, playing in South Australia.

4.

Adam Goodes moved with his family to Horsham, Victoria, where he played football at high school and represented at under-16 and under-18 levels.

5.

Adam Goodes played in a winning premiership side with the Rebels, where he was scouted by the Sydney Swans.

6.

Adam Goodes took his mother to the Brownlow Medal ceremony in 2003.

7.

Brett, who is 4 years younger than Adam Goodes, played 22 AFL games for the Western Bulldogs between 2013 and 2015.

8.

Adam Goodes was drafted by Sydney into the Australian Football League as the 43rd pick in the 1997 AFL Draft, Sydney's third round draft pick.

9.

Adam Goodes spent the 1998 season in the reserves competition, but broke into the first team the following year and went on to win the league's Rising Star Award.

10.

However, coach Rodney Eade resigned mid-season and under interim coach Paul Roos, Adam Goodes found himself playing more in the ruck.

11.

In 2003, Adam Goodes returned to the ruck position for significant parts of the year in what became his best season to that point.

12.

Adam Goodes played a critical role in the Swans' revival and eventual preliminary final game that year.

13.

Adam Goodes attributed his success to his longtime mentor John Winter.

14.

Adam Goodes had an indifferent 2004, much like his team, who only managed the semi-finals stage of the finals series.

15.

Adam Goodes did not repeat his efforts of 2003, mainly due to knee injuries, yet he still managed to play every game.

16.

Many expected Adam Goodes to have suffered a posterior or anterior knee ligament damage, but he battled on.

17.

Adam Goodes played in the backline for the remainder of 2004.

18.

Adam Goodes returned to form in 2005, playing mainly in the midfield.

19.

Adam Goodes's year was highlighted with a near match-winning 33 disposals in round 18 against the Adelaide Crows.

20.

Adam Goodes played well in the 2005 Grand Final, kicked a goal and gathering 20 possessions as the Swans won their first premiership since 1933.

21.

Adam Goodes was awarded life membership of the Swans after playing his 150th game during the year.

22.

In Round 7,2006, Adam Goodes played his 150th consecutive match, a notable effort with the injuries he had in 2004.

23.

Adam Goodes returned to the ruck position in 2005 and 2006, but only occasionally around the ground and not at centre bounces where his knee injury occurred.

24.

In 2006 Adam Goodes had another notable year and again won the Brownlow Medal.

25.

Adam Goodes came into the count as a heavy favourite and became the twelfth player to have won two or more Brownlow Medals, the first Aboriginal Australian to win two, and the first player to win two with a non-Victorian club.

26.

Adam Goodes had a poor performance in the first half of the 2006 Grand Final against the West Coast Eagles in a repeat of 2005.

27.

Adam Goodes had Brownlow Medal-threatening suspensions and charges during both years.

28.

Adam Goodes was arguably one of the best players throughout the 2009 season, playing in the forward line because of Barry Hall's mid-season departure.

29.

Adam Goodes finished the season with 38 goals and averaged 21 disposals.

30.

Adam Goodes played some high standard football in 2009 in what was a relatively disappointing season in which the Swans finished 12th and failed to make the finals for the first time in six years.

31.

Adam Goodes polled three Brownlow Medal votes in the Round 7 match against Geelong which Sydney lost by 51 points.

32.

In 2010 Adam Goodes averaged about 20 disposals and two goals a game, having been at the forefront of Sydney's revival.

33.

Adam Goodes finished sixth in the Bob Skilton Medal and was named in the initial 40 player All-Australian squad but not in the final side.

34.

Adam Goodes started 2011 playing mostly in the Swans' forward line.

35.

Adam Goodes played his 300th AFL game when the Sydney Swans tackled Hawthorn in a second semi-final, losing by 36 points.

36.

Adam Goodes became the quickest player in AFL history to reach the milestone, breaking 2003 joint-Brownlow Medalist Mark Ricciuto's record by 274 days.

37.

In 2011 Adam Goodes started as the second favourite for the Brownlow but finished eighth overall, and won the 2011 Sydney Swans' Best and Fairest, beating Josh Kennedy and Rhyce Shaw, who tied for second.

38.

Adam Goodes broke the Sydney games record when he played his 304th AFL game with a strong contribution in the Swans' Round 5,2012, victory over Hawthorn at York Park in Launceston, Tasmania.

39.

Adam Goodes suffered a quad injury in Round 6 and was expected to miss up to six games.

40.

Adam Goodes played in his second premiership when Sydney defeated Hawthorn in the 2012 AFL Grand Final.

41.

Adam Goodes announced his retirement from the AFL after the 26-point semi-final loss to North Melbourne in 2015.

42.

Adam Goodes declined an invitation to be inducted into the Australian Football Hall of Fame.

43.

Adam Goodes is of Aboriginal descent and is active in the Sydney Indigenous community.

44.

Adam Goodes has spent time working with troubled Indigenous youth, including those in youth detention centres, along with his cousin and former teammate Michael O'Loughlin.

45.

In September 2017 Adam Goodes was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Sydney for his contribution to Australian society.

46.

Adam Goodes was patron of the 2020 Indigenous Football Week, an event founded in 2015 by the John Moriarty Foundation, an organisation supporting young Indigenous soccer players.

47.

Adam Goodes wrote an essay entitled "The Indigenous Game: A Matter of Choice", published in The Australian Game of Football Since 1858.

48.

McGuire said that Collingwood had a zero-tolerance policy towards racism, but said that the girl, who later apologised to Adam Goodes, did not know that what she had said was a racial slur.

49.

Adam Goodes said that he was "gutted" and that he had "never been more hurt" but nevertheless called on the community to support the girl instead of blame her.

50.

Adam Goodes spoke to her the following day after she phoned to apologise, saying that she had not realised how deeply it had affected him.

51.

Adam Goodes repeated that the girl should not be blamed; the environment that she grew up in had shaped her response.

52.

The situation would be inflamed further five days later when McGuire stated on radio that Adam Goodes would be a good person to advertise a theatre run of King Kong.

53.

The booing of Adam Goodes has been described as a symptom of tall poppy syndrome.

54.

Adam Goodes said after the incident that the dance was based on one he learned from under-16s Indigenous team the Flying Boomerangs, and that it was intended as an expression of Indigenous pride during Indigenous Round, not as a means of offending or intimidating the crowd.

55.

The booing of Adam Goodes intensified in the months after the war dance, leading further public debate and to Indigenous Affairs Minister Nigel Scullion calling the booers "ignorant".

56.

Adam Goodes was surprised by the attention and negative reaction to his dance, and later apologised for any offence, saying that because he was depicting an "Aboriginal warrior" and the ceremony was a "war cry" it needed to be directed at the opposing team's players.

57.

Adam Goodes returned the following week and played for the remainder of the season after an outpouring of support on social media; and from fans, actors, politicians, celebrities and teammates, including two spontaneous standing ovations.

58.

Adam Goodes did not attend the Grand Final, where retiring players traditionally take part in a parade, one of only a handful of players to decline this invitation since the parade for retiring players was established.

59.

Adam Goodes, who represents so much that is good and unique about our game, was subject to treatment that drove him from football.

60.

Besides that Adam Goodes served as a product ambassador for Qantas; according to the airline's online magazine Travel Insider he mentioned as having traveled to places such as New York City and East Africa.

61.

Adam Goodes was one of the contributors to Anita Heiss' 2018 biographical anthology Growing Up Aboriginal In Australia.

62.

Adam Goodes documented his early years, mentioning the story of his mother of the Adnyamathanha and Narungga peoples who was a member of the Stolen Generations.

63.

Adam Goodes played no part in the making of The Final Quarter but gave it his full support after watching it.