Declan Mountford has gone a long way since he made his league debut for Claremont as a shy 18-year-old who was in his own words “a 60 kilogram young kid just hiding out on a wing.”
Now, ten years later, he is a powerfully-built star with his weight boosted to 79kg, including the recent addition of titanium screws and bolts in his right shoulder which has enabled him to return to action after missing nine matches.
Mountford damaged his shoulder in the round three match against East Perth in April, an injury which required surgery and the inclusion of a few bolts and nuts. He resumed playing in last Saturday’s match against Subiaco, and pulled up in excellent shape as he prepares to lead the Tigers into action against East Fremantle at East Fremantle Oval on Saturday when he will celebrate his 100th league match.
“The AC ligaments ripped away, leaving nothing to keep my shoulder bone in place,” he said. “The bone kept slipping out of position, and all’s fine now, and hopefully this will fix my golf swing.”
After his league debut against Swan Districts at Bassendean Oval, Mountford dropped back to the colts side, and he was a shining light with 25 disposals and two goals when Claremont beat Swans by 69 points in the grand final at Subiaco Oval.
In that year (2015) he was also a star in five matches for the WA under-18 side and was named in the WA colts Team of the Year, and he then was drafted by North Melbourne and played in all 18 matches in 2016 for Werribee, an affiliate of the Kangaroos.
Mountford made his AFL debut in 2017 in a round one fixture against the West Coast Eagles at the Docklands but was dropped for several weeks before regaining his place in North’s AFL side and he performed strongly in the club’s final eleven matches of the season when he was used as a rebounding half-back flanker and as a tagger. In his fourth senior match, as a 20-yeear-old, he was widely praised for his performance as a tagger when opposed to Gold Coast’s Gary Ablett junior in the superstar’s 300th game.
Bad luck struck again the following year when Mountford required minor surgery on his left shoulder which was damaged when he dived for a ground ball in a pre-season training session in February 2018. This was followed with ankle and hamstring injuries, and he was delisted at the end of the year, with twelve AFL appearances to his credit.
The North Albany product from a farming family in Mount Manypeaks was delighted to be able to return to Claremont, and in 2019 he polled 323 votes to finish second in the E. B. Cook Medal as Claremont’s fairest-and-best league player, finishing just three votes behind Kane Mitchell. Since then he has finished fourth three times for the Cook Medal (2020, 2021 and 2023) and sixth in 2022.
It was in 2019 that Mountford recorded a remarkable tally of 175 tackles in 21 matches, and after 99 matches his tackle total stands at 531 — more than five per match. He is a highly professional athlete and an inspirational leader who was co-captain of the Tigers league side in 2021 (the year he made his interstate debut for WA against South Australia in Adelaide) and he has served as captain in the following four seasons. In 2021 Mountford added two AFL appearances to his record when he was used by the Eagles in games against North Melbourne and Brisbane as part of West Coast’s top-up list after the club was hit by injuries and COVID protocols.
Like several of his teammates Mountford has unhappy memories of playing in losing grand finals against South Fremantle in 2020 and West Perth in 2022.
“Playing one hundred games is not as important as winning a flag, and our form this year has been good,” he said. “We have matured as a group this year, and all the young guys coming through are really impressing, and we are also getting good production from the senior players.”
