The former NTFL star notched up a career-best 22 possessions, 12 marks and three goals in round 21 against last year’s Grand Finalists Hawthorn. The key position player, who recently spent the Christmas break catching up with his younger brother and sisters in the Top End, is light on his feet having shed 8kgs off his frame since the start of pre-season training.
“I’ve improved on all my times and dropped all my weight, Stephen [Schwerdt] likes making us run a lot,” smirked May.
“He’s great though… he’s very structured and knows what he’s talking about, and the best part is he gives us all a reason behind every exercise we do.”
“He’ll say ‘We’re doing this to improve this area of fitness’, and then give us goal times… and if he sees that we’ve run hard enough during the drills he’ll reward us by not having to do extra running, which in turn motivates us more.”
The former U18 All Australian full-forward, said he’d been bugging GC SUNS coach Guy McKenna for two years to give him a crack in the goal-square, and has since forced McKenna at considering playing the NT-product further up the ground.
“Whenever I pestered him to play me up forward, he’d come back saying he saw me more a back-man which was understandable with so many injuries to our defenders last year, so when I finally got my chance to go up there I wanted to make sure I put in a really good game.”
“When we came back after last season Bluey sort of took me aside and said he’d like to see me as a swingman, which is great because now that gives me two spots on the team to try get a game.”
When asked whether or not he’d need to develop his offensive attack more before switching to the forward line, May said he believed having played on some of the AFL’s best forwards significantly aided in his development.
“When you’re a defender and get assigned to forwards like Kurt Tippett and Lance Franklin, you see what they do and what works for them, and you learn from it.”
“At the end of the day, whether Bluey wants to put me at centre half-forward or in the back flanks, it doesn’t worry me… I just want to play senior football with the Gold Coast.”
