I think to be drafted from outside Victoria you have to stand out. This is especially true in NSW and Queensland. If you are pretty good, then there are hundreds of kids that are pretty good in the TAC and Vic schools that the recruiters know and have seen week in and week out for many years. Why would they pick some kid from NSW that they don't know over a similar kid in Melbourne that they know well.
So for non Vic kids you either have to be very good, or move to Melbourne and hope the recruiters get to know you. The risk with going to Melb is that you start at the bottom with few contacts, and you may significantly disrupt your footy and school.
I know we went through this with our son at the Swans Academy. We had support from Geelong and Carlton to move him to a school in Melbourne, however he would have chucked his final year of school and there was a real risk that he would have struggled with the footy.
He is a good player, and if he grew up in Melbourne might have been draftable. But he is not yet a standout player and so growing up in Sydney means he is not on anyone's radar. The compounding factor of course is that other clubs are also discouraged from looking at these kids because they don't want to compete with the Swans Academies drafting rights.
For the swans themselves, their recruiting team is based in Melbourne and is deliberately (and correctly) separate from the Sydney Academy. If a Sydney player is a standout (Mills Heeney etc) they are very interested but a good kid, again they have the whole TAC group to choose from.
In summary if you are outside Vic you have to be very good to make it worthwhile for the recruiters to look at you.
So for non Vic kids you either have to be very good, or move to Melbourne and hope the recruiters get to know you. The risk with going to Melb is that you start at the bottom with few contacts, and you may significantly disrupt your footy and school.
I know we went through this with our son at the Swans Academy. We had support from Geelong and Carlton to move him to a school in Melbourne, however he would have chucked his final year of school and there was a real risk that he would have struggled with the footy.
He is a good player, and if he grew up in Melbourne might have been draftable. But he is not yet a standout player and so growing up in Sydney means he is not on anyone's radar. The compounding factor of course is that other clubs are also discouraged from looking at these kids because they don't want to compete with the Swans Academies drafting rights.
For the swans themselves, their recruiting team is based in Melbourne and is deliberately (and correctly) separate from the Sydney Academy. If a Sydney player is a standout (Mills Heeney etc) they are very interested but a good kid, again they have the whole TAC group to choose from.
In summary if you are outside Vic you have to be very good to make it worthwhile for the recruiters to look at you.