GEELONG coach Chris Scott has hailed Bailey Smith’s first 12 months at the club as an “outrageous success”, after the AFL wrote to the Cats with a warning about the star midfielder’s controversial social media presence.

Smith has been repeatedly pulled up by both Geelong and the League across recent months, following an altercation with a female photographer at training and then multiple social media posts regarding respected journalist Caroline Wilson.

Scott, who was announced as the new Victoria coach this week ahead of February’s AFL Origin clash, said he was aware of communication between the League and the Cats but said he welcomed the collaborative approach to the matter.

Scott said he had spoken to Smith since the side’s season finished following its Grand Final loss to Brisbane around a month ago, but moved to cool talk the club was having issues in dealing with its star player.

“We almost wear it as a badge of honour that we don’t consider our role as one of ownership of our players. That’s just not the way we think about the world,” Scott said.

“But there is an expectation that we will work together, hopefully as much as possible as peers, to continually get better.

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“Now, I hesitate to bring that sort of stuff up because it does give the impression of amplifying the current situation to a point where I don’t think it is. I can’t control what others might choose to amplify, but what I would say is we are really confident that it’s in a really good spot.

“If you separate out the off-field issues – that’s probably the best way to describe it – and if we think through how the last 12 months have gone with Bailey, it’s been an outrageous success. Outrageous.

“It’s not perfect, but if you were privy to some of the information with a whole range of our players, I think it’s likely that it’s going to be a similar sort of description.

“Some bits have gone really, really well. Other bits, we’ve got to nudge and manage a little bit. But that’s all it is. It’s a nudge here and there. I just refuse to buy into the idea that there’s some serious, major work to be done. I just don’t believe that to be true.”

Scott joked that he had already found around 60 locks for his first Victoria squad, suggesting that new Sydney recruit Charlie Curnow would be one of them after his Geelong side tried unsuccessfully to poach him from Carlton during this month’s Continental Tyres AFL Trade Period.

“I’ve been thinking a bit about Charlie Curnow over the last couple of weeks. I’d be very surprised if he wasn’t someone that I’d like to see wearing the ‘Big V’,” Scott said.

“It’s a long list and I shouldn’t individualise too much. The ones that sprung to mind for me were the players at either end of their careers, to an extent.

“I’m not retiring Marcus Bontempelli, but … this is as close as we’re going to get to the real deal and a chance for him, at this stage of his career as probably the pre-eminent player in the competition. I hope that’s exciting for him, it’s certainly exciting for me.

“Then I think about some of the young players that could get picked. He’s a lock, but he’s still a young player, Nick Daicos. Him coming into that team, you’d be crazy … if you haven’t, as a coach, at one stage thought about, ‘If he were in our team, how would we use him?’ The mind boggles a little bit.

“There are others as well. I’m not sure that Tom Stewart has played for Victoria. It seems crazy to me – and I’m highly biased – but I think he’s been the best defender of the generation. For him to get the chance to play for Victoria, it’s something he would relish and I would love to see him in that environment.”

Scott revealed his belief that the timing of February’s AFL Origin game means most players will put their hands up to play, suggesting most of the competition’s stars would rather be representing Victoria than their own club in a meaningless pre-season practice match.

He used 35-year-old Patrick Dangerfield as an example, saying the risk of injury would always be present at that stage of the season regardless of whether his veteran Cats captain was playing for Victoria or for Geelong.

“[Dangerfield] is a good example, and it helps explain why I think the timing is optimal,” Scott said.

“Our preference, and every club thinks about these things a little differently I suspect, but our preference is for him to have played some practice games before round one. That goes for all of our players, from Patrick at 35 through to our first- and second-year players.

“The reality is, they’ll be playing anyway. The good coaches that I’ve had dealings with over the years, when you talk about mitigating injury risk, you can get injured in a practice game, you can get injured in a home and away game, that’s just a risk that you need to take.

“It’s likely that, over time, there will be injuries in these games. I would caution people from overreacting to those and acknowledge that it could well have happened at a practice game in Bunbury.

“Time will tell a little bit, but my suspicion is that most clubs and most players, if they’re playing that weekend, would prefer to be playing with Western Australia or Victoria as opposed to their club in that week.