“My knee ruled my whole world,” the Sydney Swans forward Chloe Molloy says, reflecting on her past year.
As one of the AFLW’s leading players, she had been primed to propel the Swans towards the finals in 2024. But in training before the second round, she felt pain in her right knee.
“I felt like, heading into the season last year, I’d really honed in on being a full-time footballer,” she says. “And then I got told ‘you’ve done your knee’.”
Molloy Runs sprints at Tramway Oval on 13 June
She didn’t want her teammates to worry before their second match, so she tried to keep secret her injury’s severity. But while they were on the field preparing, word got around. The Swans lost by 16 points to the Saints, the first defeat in a season that – without Molloy – saw them underachieve.
The then 25-year-old faced her own adversity. She had experienced back and foot injuries in the past, but this was different. “Nothing prepares you for an ACL. Holy moly, the ACL is a different beast,” she says. “You take a graft from your hamstring to turn it into a ligament, and you just can’t speed up that process.”
Molloy recovers from her ACL injury. Running sprints. Infrared sauna at Rehub in Bondi, stretching and physio.
In the early weeks, she was either on crutches or on the couch, icing her knee in agony. And that was before the rehabilitation began. “Running patterns, running lines, turning direction, tedious, tedious, tedious drills that you have to respect, but they friggin’ suck.”
She admits it was a difficult time. Her family was in Victoria, her partner in Queensland. She wondered why she was doing it at all, given a return to professional sport meant a good chance she could do her knee again. And although she was co-captain of the Swans, Molloy didn’t want to impose herself on her teammates.
“You don’t want to put your stuff on someone else’s plate, especially being in season and as a leader,” she says. “I felt like my responsibility was to protect my teammates, and make sure that they were preparing the best they could.”
Molloy uses a Biodex machine, which measures an athlete’s power, strength and stability
She channelled her energies into her rehabilitation, targeting a return for round one this year. Her surgeon described her as “overconfident”, yet still she hit the milestones.
“When you see me on that machine, it’s a test that you need to pass,” she says, recalling the photograph of her seated and lifting her leg. “I hope I never have to sit on one of those machines again.”
But through the repetition, the routine, came something else. She began to recognise that this was an opportunity, and the time in the gym could provide her a new edge. She revisited her whole lifestyle – from nutrition, to sleep – to see what she could refine.
“Every decision I made was about … how much time am I on my feet, what shoes am I wearing, am I setting myself up for success,” she says. “I’d finish one session, and I’d already start thinking about the next one.”
Molloy poses for a selfie with fans after her return match
Earlier this month Molloy returned to play in a warm-up match, one month ahead of schedule. After two outings this AFLW season, she leads the competition with 11 goals and her side is unbeaten. But ahead of Saturday’s clash against Geelong, she admits she doesn’t want to “get too ahead of myself”.
Though her knee once ruled her world, now there is more to it. “What rules my world now is showing up for my teammates,” she says. “Making sure I’m not letting the person next to me down in whatever I’m doing.”
