AFL Talent Ambassador and draft doyen Kevin Sheehan has spoken glowingly of prospect Edward Allan, the son of former Hawthorn star and Fremantle captain Ben Allan.
Allan, a 194-centimetre utility with elite speed, needed just one colts game for Claremont to earn a call-up to the WA state U18 team, having missed time with a long-term lower back injury.
“I’m watching Edward Allan play in the one state game he played this year, we knew it was Ben’s son at the time, he’d been injured so he’d just had one colts game before that, he’d played five for the year and they went and popped him in this game,” Sheehan told AFL Trade Radio.
“He started on the wing so I’m having a good look at him, as I reckon most of the clubs would be doing it again, going back over it, because that speed was elite.
“He’s 194cm, so he’s six foot four, he starts here on the wing, but he can play on the inside as well. I didn’t interview him, but I spoke to him at length, just sitting around waiting for things to occur at times, a very bright, switched-on young fellow.
“He would’ve been super impressive, every club spoke to him, don’t worry about that, and that was before he did his sprints. I think that makes them really assess his position in the draft.”
The older Allan was a star rover at Waverley in the early 1990s, winning the best and fairest in the club’s 1991 premiership season, before returning home to Western Australia to become the Dockers’ inaugural captain in 1995.
Despite Allan’s success with the Hawks, his 98 appearances in the brown and gold fall agonisingly short of the 100 required for the club to claim Edward under the father son rule.
Instead, Hawthorn may be forced to watch on as a rival club swoops in on the 18-year-old.
“He’s got that elite speed, his father was a star as you know, best and fairest in a premiership year is always a good one to have on your CV,” Sheehan reminisced.
“He did that for the Hawks, but gee they’d be starting to rue, 98 games, they couldn’t keep him for another two to get the hundred that qualifies for father-son.
“All the clubs will have watched him late in the year, but they’ll be double checking (their ratings again). He was always going to get drafted just on what we’d seen of him, but gee the position now will be very, very interesting as to where he goes based on that performance.”