Most AFL players were pleased by confirmation that Round 1 of the 2020 season would go ahead, but none more so than Sam Naismith. And understandably so.

While most players have only had to wait about six months since their last game, Naismith has been sidelined by injury since the 2017 semi-final against Geelong at the MCG.

It was September 15, 2017. So on Saturday he will end an absence from football of two years and 189 days. Or 919 days.

No less than nine teammates from Naismith’s last game in what was Jarrad McVeigh’s 300^th AFL game are no longer playing with the club.

McVeigh, Kieren Jack, Heath Grundy and Nick Smith have retired, and Dan Hannebery and Zak Jones (St Kilda), Gary Rohan (Geelong) and Nic Newman (Carlton) are playing elsewhere.

And 13 new players have joined the all-time Swans playing list: Darcy Cameron (now at Collingwood), Ryley Stoddart, Colin O’Riordan, Ben Ronke and Tom McCartin (2018), Justin McInerney, James Bell, Hayden McLean, Dan Menzel, Jackson Thurlow, James Rowbottom, Ryan Clarke and Nick Blakey (2019).

Naismith, showing good form in the pre-season, will return to football wearing the number-10 guernsey after he had played his first 28 games between 2015 and 2017 in the number 35.

Naismith’s absence is nothing like the club’s longest time between games, but there is a certain symmetry between Naismith’s comeback and the player who holds that record.

It was Round 1 in 1945, 75 years ago, that the great Laurie Nash returned from a self-imposed absence of seven years and 236 days. Or 2791 days.

Nash, named at centre half-forward in the Swans Team of the Century, played his  82^nd game for the club in the final round of 1937.

A member of the 1933 premiership side, Nash had captained South Melbourne in 1937 at the behest of new coach Roy Cazaly to complete the then VFL’s first father-son captaincy duo after his father Bob had captained Collingwood in 1908 and 1909.

But he’d split with the club after the 1937 and played with Camberwell in the VFA between 1938 and 1941 before enlisting with the Australian armed forces in February 1942. He fought in New Guinea before suffering a knee injury in a car crash which eventually saw him given a medical discharge in February 1944.

He played 17 games in 1945 before retiring at 35 with 99 career games to his credit.

Nash is one of eight Swans players who went more than five years between AFL games.

Bob Pratt, Swans Team of the Century forward, had a similar experience to Nash. After the end of the 1939 season he had a stint in the VFL and served in the war before a one-game comeback in Round 1, 1946. He was six years and 232 days between games.

Fred Carpenter, six years and 21 days between games in 1913 and 1919, was next on the list.

Alex Johnson, a 2012 premiership defender, was five years and 309 games between matches due to recurring knee problems, while Bill Strang, a member of the club’s losing Grand Final side in 1907, was five years and 231 days between games without premiership success.

Gordon Goldsmith played only eight games for South Melbourne in the 1930s and was five years and 281 days between his first and second games, while Bobby Mullenger and Gerry Hayes were much the same.

Two other Swans players were longer between Swans games but played elsewhere in between.

Western Australian Harvey Kelly, who finished a nomadic career in the 1914 Grand Final, played nine games with the club in 1902 before time at East Fremantle (1903-1904), South Fremantle (1905-1906), Carlton (1907-1909) and Lefroy in Tasmania (1910-1911).

After a year off he returned to South Melbourne in 1913. His 10^th game for the club was 10 years and 274 days after his ninth.

Herb Matthews, father of Brownlow medallist Herbie Matthews Sr and grandfather of Herbie Matthews Jr, played one game with South Melbourne in 1914 before playing at Richmond (1915) and Melbourne (1919-1922).

He returned to South Melbourne in 1923 and was eight years and 326 days between his first and second game in club colours.

The longest period between games in VFL/AFL history of 13 years and 12 days belongs to Syd Barker after whom the North Melbourne best-and-fairest award is named.

Originally from Essendon in the VFA, Barker played two VFL games with Richmond in 1908 before abandoning the league to return to the VFA, where he played with North Melbourne and became an institution between 1909 and 1921.

He played his third VFL game with Essendon in 1921 after his 13-year absence from the league, and after 57 games with Essendon from 1921-1924 emerged from retirement in 1927 to play nine games as North Melbourne captain-coach following the club's 1925 addition to the premier competition.

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