Adelaide Premiership defender Chelsea Biddell had returned to pre-season training fired up and hungry for more success ahead of the AFLW’s Season Seven kicking off.
But a month in, Biddell’s preparation hit a stumbling block when an innocuous incident occurred during training, two days before players were set to leave for their Darwin trip.
“It was in a training drill, I went to tackle Montana (McKinnon) and her elbow got in the way and just hit me fair in the eye,” Biddell said.
“It was extremely painful, I fell to the ground (and) it blew up straight away.
“My vision was pretty blurry. I had double vision for a couple of days.
“The eye pretty much closed over so I couldn’t really see out of it at all.
“It was a little bit scary, I guess anything to do with the eyes is always a little bit scary.”
Scans taken the next day revealed Biddell had fractured her eye socket and it would require surgery, meaning she was not able to join her teammates in Darwin.
“Thankfully there was no damage or anything to the eye, which was good,” Biddell said.
“I just had to take it easy after the surgery and not do anything too strenuous.
“I couldn’t really do gym or anything that was high intensity otherwise I might’ve burst a blood vessel, so I had to take it relatively easy for the first week.”
Biddell has, however, found a silver lining to the injury setback, saying she’s fitter than ever.
“I slowly built into training,” Biddell said.
“I started with a bit of jogging and then built into some more intense running and skills.
“As of Saturday I was into full training and getting back into that contact and tackling and stuff and it’s good to be back with the girls not running by myself.
“I have been able to do a lot of running.
“I’m probably the fittest I’ve been for a while and I’m ready for Season Seven.”
Biddell enjoyed a breakout Season Six after being switched from the forward line to defence.
She played every game, including the Grand Final win against Melbourne, and averaged 9.7 disposals.
The 24-year-old said she was keen for the new campaign to kick off.
“We are all so excited for the season to start,” Biddell said.
“I just want to continue to build on my confidence and hopefully keep playing some solid footy.
“We want to win (the Premiership) again.
“Going back-to-back would be absolutely awesome.
“It’s not something that’s ever been done before and getting two in one year would be wicked.”
Adelaide takes on Melbourne at Glenelg Oval on Friday, with the first bounce at 7.10pm.
Tickets available here.
