Vic inner sanctum: Garry Lyon’s Origin insight

Garry Lyon has provided a plethora of behind-the-scenes insight into the Victorian squad.

The former Melbourne captain, who proudly represented and skippered Victoria during his career, was the chairman of selectors and an ambassador for the 2026 State of Origin return.

Lyon had a lot to unpack in the aftermath of the Big V’s 24-point win over Western Australia in Perth on Saturday night.

“I had the best five days. They were just the most outstanding group who loved it every bit as much as I did,” Lyon said on SEN Breakfast.

The surprise packet in the Vic pecking order

“One of the hard things to do in these teams in when you’re on your own coming into a very intimidating group of players.

“That was Hugh McCluggage who was our only Brisbane Lion. What you see is what you get with Hughie, he’s a great country lad.

“Geez, can he play. That’s what I kept thinking was that, ‘Can he play!’.”

Toby Greene’s demeanour and desire to play

“He’s calculating. We were a bit unsure if he’d play but not in his mind.

“He just said to the Giants, ‘No, I’m playing’. They wanted to manage his minutes and he must have said, ‘Yeah, ok’, and that got relayed to us and Toby said, ‘Don’t worry about that, just play me how you want to play me’.

“I thought he was superb.”

Watching Nick Daicos up close

“Collingwood fans and Craig McRae - I’m sure they realise what they’ve got.

“But when you only get a little snapshot like I did you just want more.

“At one stage Jack Gunston was doing some forward leading stuff out of the goal square and Gunston said he was just running flat out and the ball just hit him on the chest from 50 metres with Nick Daicos banging it down his throat on the left.”

The confident and energetic Suns

“If you’re a Suns supporter out there, those four boys (Noah Anderson, Matt Rowell, Sam Collins and Ben King) just bounced into camp.

“The whole joint was energised.”

The level of care for injured Weitering

“We all had our heart in our mouth.

“The level of care for him was just extraordinary. The Carlton medicos knew he was in the best possible hands.

“I got a message yesterday from him and he’s got one cracked rib. He might have got away with it.”

Did Garry offer up his business class seat to Weitering?

“Of course I did. He was not willing to take but with some prompting (he did).”

Running Cat out of position

“I don’t think Max Holmes was thrilled he ended up at full-back at one stage.

“But the selfless nature of the team, they all took it.”

What was Chris Scott’s message for the players?

“I thought the choices were superb. Chris Scott is such a levelled coach, he just coaches at a (controlled) level.

“I spoke to Danger about him, he said, ‘Nah, he doesn’t raise his voice’.

“Scott said to the players, ‘We want to get out of your way. We rate you blokes highly so we won’t get in your way. We want you to play on instinct, we want you to go’.

“We thought the midfield was really deep.

“Zak Butters turned one over early which resulted in a goal and the messaging was, ‘Go and tell Zak to double down and do it again’. The message was to go and just play, play quick, back your skills, take the game on, don’t go backwards, just go forward.

“The thing that struck me the most was how calm he and Sam Mitchell were.”

Grigg and Mitchell impress as assistants

“Shaun Grigg was so impressive. He was the one who was delivering the messages down in the box.

“Sammy Mitchell sat next to him. He was feverishly working the computer. Something would happen, ‘How did Cripps get free there?’, Mitchell would go bang, ‘Have a look’, straight up on the computer.

“This all probably happens every week but it was all new for me.

“I sat next to Danny Daly who is a great footy man and he kept an eye on a couple of little things.”

Merrett out of the midfield

“Zach Merrett doesn’t go to a centre bounce for the first time probably in his life.

“I thought he was fantastic in the role that he played.”

The others who impressed

“I thought Caleb Serong was unbelievable.

“Hugh McCluggage’s class just stood out.

“What a gun Ed Richards is. Sam Darcy didn’t get to the level that he will get to, but his training form in the lead-up just had us all mesmerised.

“Jack Gunston was great. At 34 he’s got power still.”

Butters the club-changer

“Butters is the one. He is a club-changer, that’s the way I see him.

“He will change your footy club. If you’re a great club he’ll make you better. If you’re a club who needs competitiveness and standards…

“I think the cheque books might just find themselves getting bigger and bigger and bigger.”

The power of Danger

“I saw Danger jumping on this box. He’d sit on another box and then he’d just jump two feet up onto other box.

“I thought he had a little trampoline there. I went around the side and he was doing it off the ground, just exploding off the ground.

“It was just extraordinary at his age. His power is extraordinary.”

What’s Bailey Smith like?

“I was really interested to spend a bit of time with Bailey and see how he went about it.

“He’s as different as any player I’ve probably come across. But when it comes to the footy he’s as dialled in and as invested and across everything as any bloke in that team.

“That should give you some indication that you can live two lifestyles. He’s clearly got his social life which gets a lot of coverage.

“My message to anyone out there - and we can all make assumptions from afar - is don’t mistake that for any less intent in terms of his footy. He was brilliant, across everything, had to get to the game early for his own routine.

“Once the game is over he also has his own routine.

“He and Nick (Daicos), at the training run, it was just like The Beatles. There was screaming.”

Which WA player provided the most headaches?

“In the third quarter it was Tom Barrass.

“He was enormous. I was getting a bit frustrated. He was reading it beautifully, I thought he was sensational.

“Jesse Hogan’s five goals was a great performance, Chad Warner had his moments, Lawson Humphries was great.”

The unlucky players to miss out

“I think Harry Sheezel was right there. He won’t be too far away.

“Finn Callaghan (was close), Andrew Brayshaw was probably next up.

“Josh Treacy and Nick Larkey were discussed in that mix with Ben King to replace Jeremy Cameron. They’ll be in consideration somewhere along the way.

“I was desperate for Tom Papley to play. I think we needed the real creative small forward but he physically wasn’t up to it.

“We did discuss ‘The Wizard’ (Nick Watson). He was not too far away.”

Lyon also went through each Victorian player not previously mentioned and provided a comment.

Noah Anderson (Gold Coast)

“The group was a bit quiet early and at half-time I said to Danger, ‘Have we got enough voice out there?’, he said, ‘Yeah, yeah, when Noah came on it went up’.

“That’s high praise from Danger. He walked into that midfield group and Danger said that’s when leadership took over.”

Lachie Ash (GWS)

“He didn’t know whether he fit in. He said he was nervous about whether he should have been there.

“Chris Scott said he’s the best running back in the competition. I thought he was absolutely brilliant.

“He’ll go back to the club a better player.”

Josh Battle (Hawthorn)

“As fanatical as anyone in the group. Appreciative of the opportunity.

“He was part of that back six that you didn’t really think too much about (as a coach).”

Marcus Bontempelli (Western Bulldogs)

“He drove the whole thing. He’s a statesman of the game.

“When we needed someone to do some defensive work from midfield he was the one that put it on the line.”

Sam Collins (Gold Coast)

“A beauty. Just reliable, rock solid.

“Part of this Gold Coast group that’s going to give it a nudge.”

Nick Daicos (Collingwood)

“I wrote them all a message yesterday and I spent a bit of time on his because what can you say to the bloke who gets lauded and lauded and lauded, rightfully.

“The thing about him is his humility. How he takes all this praise on board and every single game that he plays - no matter if it’s home and away, practice match, final, Grand Final, Anzac Day - we all expect him to be the best player. And he is.

“He was magnificent in that match.”

Sam Darcy (Western Bulldogs)

“Quiet humble, he’s a sponge. I sat with the forwards and at training, it was he and Ben King, there was Danger, Toby Greene and Jack Gunston.

“They were talking about how they’d do it and he was just sitting there soaking it all up.

“I know he didn’t have a great game but I think he might be the best player by the end of it.”

Max Gawn (Melbourne)

“Maxy didn’t have his best game either.

“I did talk to him and he said they didn’t throw it up high enough.
“He had a little bit of hamstring awareness and I had to ask him a hundred times if he was right. And he was.

“He sat in behind Bont as one of the leaders of the group. He’s one of the all-timers.”

Blake Hardwick (Hawthorn)

“Unbelievable. It didn’t matter who went down there, whether it was Charlie Cameron or Kozzie Pickett or Shai Bolton, he just didn’t worry about it.

“That’s what Sam Mitchell told us we’d get and we got exactly that.”

Ed Richards (Western Bulldogs)

“He played a bit of everywhere. He was going to be in that midfield rotation but he ended up going into the back rotation cos we went one down (with the Jacob Weitering injury).

“He could be a starting midfielder (for Victoria). He is for the Dogs but he could have been a first-starter in that group as well.”

Matt Rowell (Gold Coast)

“He’s nearly my favourite.

“I think he got a broken knuckle and he quietly sat in the back of the box and didn’t really tell anyone, he was just looking at his hand.

“They had to say he couldn’t go back on and he was just filthy.

“You should see him train or at least watch him do his warm-up before a game. It’s back in the Nick Riewoldt days, he was running everywhere, going bonkers before the game started.”

Caleb Serong (Fremantle)

“I’ve spoken about him earlier - a better player than I thought.”

Jack Sinclair (St Kilda)

“Understand why they’ve announced him as St Kilda co-captain.

“He could play anywhere, he’s just a class act.”

Tom Stewart (Geelong)

“He would play until he’s 40. We had a few jokes that you mightn’t play with Tom Stewart again. In the end he cracked them, ‘Hey, hey, hey, I’m not that old’.

“He was magnificent.”

Ben King (Gold Coast)

“Ben King was the replacement for Jeremy Cameron and was our best forward in the end. Just jumped on them and kicked four goals.”

Listen to Gaz break it all down below: