Will Lewis took a pay cut to join the Western Bulldogs in March. Not that he's complaining.
Lewis put his job as a civil engineer on hold until the end of the season. Squared Structures, his construction company, will have him back when he's ready. He just hopes that it will be years from now, not months.
Luke Beveridge had taken a keen interest in Lewis in 2025. After playing five games in the VFL the previous year, Lewis was picked in round one and just kept kicking goals. Lots of threes. A four. And then five in the preliminary final win over Box Hill, before helping Footscray win the premiership in September.
The 27-year-old was at work on a Tuesday in February when Beveridge called. Twice. He missed both of them, as well as one from his manager, Max Hayes from TGI Sport. When he eventually returned both calls, he discovered he would have a two-week trial ahead of the SSP deadline and would be playing a practice match against Sydney the following week. The rest was up to him.
"I think 'Harmesy' announced his retirement on the Tuesday morning. I was just at work and then I had two missed calls from Bevo; I didn't have his number saved, but the voicemail was like, 'Hey, it's Bevo, give me a call back when you can'," Lewis recalls to AFL.com.au.
"I usually have my phone on me, but I left it in the office, went out on site, and then came back to that and I was like, 'Oh, what's going on here?'."