Cornes: Geelong's decision to play Cameron was “barbaric”

Jeremy Cameron has revealed the extent of his arm injury that severely hindered his 2026 campaign.

After suffering a broken arm in the 2025 AFL Grand Final, Cameron had reparative surgery with a plate inserted to hold together the arm at the break.

However, the surgery was unsuccessful, leaving the superstar forward with an entirely damaged right forearm for the entirety of the following season.

The pain was evident and at times, tough to watch, with Cameron detailing the exact issues that caused him such discomfort.

“It was frustrating throughout the year,” Cameron told SEN’s The Run Home.

“Unfortunately, my bone just didn’t unite together. It was effectively broken the whole season.

“The plate was the only thing holding it in place, but over the course of 20 games, the plate becomes a little bit loose and get a little bit of wear.

“That’s where it got a little bit wobbly towards the back end of the year. It was annoying it was frustrating and there were times where it definitely hurts.

“Falling to ground, I was trying to protect it with my other arm, looking after it that way.”

Despite the pain, Cameron was determined to suit up for the Cats.

Unable to compete for contested ball, the five-time All-Australian forward was trialled on the wing and even in defence.

It wasn’t quite as successful as Geelong would have hoped.

“It’s one of those things where, if I were to get it fixed when I first found out, I would have missed the whole season,” he said.

“That wasn’t something that I really wanted to do. I believed that I could help the team go deep into September, regardless of how it felt.

“It was unfortunate how it finished and unfortunate that I had to carry that, but that’s footy sometimes. Hopefully it’s all fixed now.

“This time around, we went a bit differently. I got a bone graft out of my hip, they put that in there around the break site, so that heels a bit better but if can be a bit slower.

“I’ve been taking it a bit easy, and I will for the next six weeks or so. I’ll get a bit of a review, and hopefully it’s all gone well.”

Kane Cornes believes the decision to field Cameron despite his evident discomfort was a disservice to their duty of care.

“It doesn’t do anything for those that believe clubs will do anything to put the win before the player,” Cornes told SEN Mornings.

“This is pretty barbaric from Geelong, to put him in that position where he is playing with a broken arm.

“Listening to that, where he wants to protect it, he can’t fall on it, there’s only a plate keeping his arm together… Geelong have not put the player first here in this instance.

“There is more to it, I understand that, and Jeremy no doubt put his hand up to play. They weren’t forcing him out onto the ground against his will.

“But at some stage, as a club, you’ve got to put the player’s interest, health and mental well-being in front of wins and losses.

“I don’t think Geelong could sit here and say that they’ve done that this year, now that we are fully across all the information from the horse’s mouth of what we’ve been through.

“We can watch it and judge it from the outside and say, ‘what are they doing, they are playing him on the wing, he’s clearly not right, they are playing him at half-back’.

“I’m going, ‘why aren’t they playing a guy who has kicked over 700 goals in the forward line. What are you doing? If he is not playing there, why are they playing him?’

“We can do all that, and we can judge them from the outside not having that information. Now we’ve got it. It’s barbaric, what they have done.”

Undergoing his recovery over the off-season, the Cats will hope to welcome Cameron back into the club at full fitness ahead of the 2027 season.