By now, you’ve probably heard the story of Oleg Markov’s summer.

He was on the Gold Coast, and then he wasn’t, as he came back to Melbourne and vied for his third chance with an AFL club.

He was training with Collingwood, and then Carlton, and then he was back again, winning the final rookie spot for the Pies in a whirlwind case of events.

But what you might not know, is the emotional journey it’s taken him on over the past 12 months.

From moments of anguish in his car, to the uncertainty of the pre-season, and the highs of being welcomed into a new environment, Markov opens up on his roller coaster ride to this year’s AFL Grand Final.

And to best understand that, we have to go all the way back to last October.

***

It was a cheeky text, one mixed with a dollop of sarcasm and a hint of seriousness, but one that masked Markov’s deteriorated mental state.

“Are you interested in a delisted free agent?”

The recipient of that text was Collingwood Head Coach Craig McRae, who only a month earlier had led the Pies to the Preliminary Final is his first season as coach.

The pair had worked together Richmond throughout the Tigers’ successful period between 2017-2020 and had been keeping in touch when the messages were exchanged.

“Throughout the year I’d messaged him as well because when he got the job I sent him a nice message to say congratulations,” Markov says.

“I just thought he was such a good person and when finals were happening watching those games from afar, I did message him a few times saying job’s not done but it’s really cool to watch.”

While McRae was apologetic given the position his 2019 VFL premiership player found himself in, Markov didn’t think much of it.

Promising he would keep an eye on him leading into the pre-season, McRae went back to enjoying his break, but what he didn’t yet know was how the defender had been struggling mentally.

In fact, the only person who really knew was Markov’s partner Beccy, who he says saw the worst of him throughout his challenging final few months with the Suns.

While he’s been asked about his journey frequently over the season, it’s not always something he’s been ready to speak about. But as he embarks on the biggest week of his career, it’s been hard not to reflect.

“I’ve been asked in the media a few times and I’ve given the cliché answer because I find I get quite emotional talking about it,” he says.

“Everyone gets to see the bubbly version of me and the version that’s always smiling and joyful but the one person that’s got to see a lot of the tears is my partner.

“She saw a version of me that I wasn’t very proud of, the version that didn’t want to get out of bed and didn’t want to leave his room.

“I lived on the Gold Coast, it was 25 degrees and I didn’t want to leave the house.

“I sat in the car crying a fair bit, I was the one who was unsure what was happening beyond football, with life.”

While still dealing with the idea that his AFL journey had come to an end, a couple of weeks after he sent that cheeky message, Markov had committed to moving on.

He started a job as a support worker at Being Mentors just north of the Gold Coast and had laid out a new hierarchy of priorities in his life.

And football wasn’t really a part of that.

“My priorities had changed from football at that time and I was going to join a QAFL club and just play locally because I knew that my priorities would’ve been work, my family, my partner and puppy, and then just having time to myself for a weekend,” he says.

“I had a few VFL clubs call me but I was pretty stand-offish with VFL, I thought if VFL was an option I would want to be in Victoria doing that.

“If I was to play VFL – I had interest from Southport and I was pretty close to considering that move – but I just knew every weekend would’ve been a fly down to Melbourne to play and be away from my first two priorities that were going to be the thing I was looking forward to.

“I was very happy to have moved on and I was very excited for the new chapter in my life.”

But then the call from McRae came. It was just after the national draft and the Pies were on the eve of pre-season as they looked to launch into the new year.

Markov was driving home from work when he took the call and was stuck in traffic, so he took the opportunity to monologue.

It formed the basis of McRae’s next question and gave the coach an insight into what he couldn’t decipher through text.

“Fly said ‘where are you at?’ and the moment he said that for forty minutes he barely got a word in,” Markov remembers.

“I just let down everything and just said where I was at and how I felt about football itself and I just opened up, I didn’t want to hold any secrets or lies to someone like him and I didn’t want to tell him a fib just so hopefully he gave me an opportunity.

“To be honest I was probably expecting him to go ‘it seems like you’ve checked out’ and I was just expecting him to hang up but he said your best footy is good enough to be in our side.

“He said I can’t promise you anything but there’s a spot here to train, would you want to come in December?”

Out of nowhere, Markov had another opportunity at his feet.

But was he ready for it?

“I was brutally honest with him and said I haven’t trained for two months,” he says.

“I’d done a little bit of running with a pace called Unfit Run Club where we were just running from bar to bar and then having a beer and I just said to be honest I’d love a four-week mini pre-season for myself so I can come in and leave no stone unturned.

“He was able to push that start date back said, ‘well I’ll see you on the 10^th of January’.”

***

So, December was up to Markov.

He trained almost every day, stayed disciplined and arrived at Collingwood a week into the new year.

And this is where the rollercoaster starts.

“Once the program started I actually wasn’t allowed to train for the first three sessions so I was stuck on the far wing, it was 30 degrees and I just had my journal and was jotting down things I was seeing,” he says.

“I was watching the boys do all these shuttles and 10–12-kilometre sessions and that morning I’d done six or seven by myself and I’m sort of second guessing if I’ve actually still got it in me.

“I did join in two or three running sessions with the boys who were here, it was really nice of Tay, Tom Mitchell, Quaynor early days to include me in their running before the program started.”

But once he did become a part of the main group, Markov felt at home right away.

Those doubts slipped into the abyss, as the dashing defender found his place.

“Once I was able to get out on the field all that fear and anxiety went away and I just enjoyed it, it was super fun,” he says.

“I just felt like Collingwood was such a great fit for me and I felt like part of the furniture.”

As each day went by, Markov felt better each session, battling it out with young ruckman Oscar Steene for the final rookie spot.

But it wasn’t just his footy that had improved. It was himself more than anything.

He’d walked away from the game barely three months ago, but already Collingwood had gotten his spark back.

“Something about those two months training on and not knowing when your last day was going to be and not having a contract, I really learnt a lot about myself and grew this incredible mentality that I was proud of,” he says.

“I think I thrived the most during that time and I look back at it and it was the most stressful time in my life but it was also the most enjoyable time.

“The whole walking away thing was a combination of not thinking I was good enough and not having an avenue within football.

“The moving away part was essentially to find joy in the sport itself because it just felt like it wasn’t at the highest level.

“It wasn’t fun being an AFL footballer and as a kid it was, so I was just trying to find that again.”

But as the Pies’ decision loomed, his family’s stress heightened.

Unsure of their living arrangements and employment, Markov and his partner had to play an agonising waiting game.

And there were numerous questions left unanswered.

“Every day my partner was calling asking where are we living? Is it in Victoria or are we in Queensland? What are your plans after? Surely they know if you’re on the list or not?,” he recalls.

“I had my Mum and Dad not knowing what was going on, was I looking for a rental? What football club was I going to play for? Where was my work going to be?

“Everything was up in the air and nothing was set.”

When the day did come, Markov was shooting hoops in the Club when McRae asked to see him on their day off the following morning.

The news was shattering as he was told he wouldn’t be offered the final position, but Markov’s new mentality was keeping him optimistic. And another chance was about to smack him in the face.

“I left that meeting with Fly and as I was walking back I called my manager straight away and said here’s the news,” he says.

“As I was on the phone he was on his computer, and he said Zac Williams has just done his knee at Carlton.

“I was still in this rollercoaster of I was down with the emotions but I was super happy because I had found a lot of joy training here, so that was a moment for me and a bit of closure to know there is still a lot of love and joy in my heart with football because that had disappeared for a period.

“I really wanted this environment, but called me about 20 minutes later and goes they (Carlton) actually got on the front foot to me and they want you to train there.”

But Markov still had to work out if that was the best move for him.

He’d re-opened his football heart and been rejected again, so did he really want to have another crack?

“As those days went by I got pretty drained of thinking what their environment was going to be like and whether I was going to fall back into the hole of being unhappy again,” he says.

“It was potentially opening myself up again and being vulnerable again, exerting all this energy again.

“Will I get rejected again? Where’s my career beyond that?

“I was pretty close at one stage turning Carlton down because Collingwood was the environment I wanted to be in.

“I felt like not many environments are going to be that similar or the same and I was very close to just going I’m ready just to play some VFL footy or country footy and set myself up being in another avenue.”

So as he met the crossroads again, he gave it one more crack.

As history will tell, he spent one day at Carlton, loving training with and meeting the players. He was ready to stay the course with them in an effort to win a spot, until his phone buzzed again.

“My manager called me as I sat in the car after one day at the Blues and he’d gone ‘hey mate, in the perfect world where would you want to be?’,” he says.

“He said ‘there’s potentially an injury with Collingwood and they want to sign ya, they’re just going through the paperwork’.

“‘Do you want to stay at the Blues and fight for their spot or do you want to sign with Collingwood?’

“I said in a perfect world I want to be at Collingwood.

“So I walk back into Carlton, grab my footy boots and sheepishly walked out not really telling anyone.

“I sat in the car and drove off and to get my mind off it went out for dinner and we were just sitting and eating and I get the text from my manger and he goes ‘congratulations you’re an SSP rookie listed player for Collingwood’.

“At that point I just remember the sigh of relief and joy and excitement and I just felt pretty proud of myself and had really good closure to know that footy was something that had a spark from me still.”

And just like that, he was back at Collingwood.

He’d taken each opportunity up until that point, so there was no reason to stop there.

***

Since debuting as the sub against Brisbane in Round Four, Markov hasn’t been out of the side.

While many of those early games were in that role, he found an appreciation for the impact he could have on the team.

“Becoming the sub, I felt like I was in really good form but having the side as it was, we had some incredible players coming back and I totally understood that,” he said.

“I think previously it might have been a ‘how’s this happened?’ and I would dwell on that, but now the best thing for me was to just accept what had happened the same way I did earlier in the year.

“I’m a pretty big over-thinker so there’s nothing worse than just sitting on the bench and overthinking everything.

“But just getting around your teammates and being able to get on the field and impact it’s been the most I’ve learned in a year of football both on and off field.”

Adversity has been a big part of his journey to, having been emergency countless times during Richmond’s run of premierships, and twice being dropped on the eve of finals.

The Qualifying Final against Melbourne was his first final after debuting seven years ago, making his previous efforts all the more worth it.

“When I was at Richmond I was fortunate enough to witness three of them (Grand Finals) that were all within my grasp,” he says.

“I was the last dropped in ’17, I was the emergency for a handful of finals, and I was an emergency for the 2020 Granny and probably a coin flip potentially away.

“Having seen that it did make me really hungry, and it just felt like they don’t happen that often and it felt like my window potentially had run out.

“Playing a handful of games and winning my first final and then a Prelim by a point it’s just been a surreal last month.

“The last month has flown so quickly and the games go really fast. I’m just trying to enjoy and be as present as I can.”

If you told Markov this timeline of events this time last year, there’s no way he would’ve believed you.

While now entering a maiden Grand Final, his favourite achievement for the year has been his personal growth.

As a much-loved member of the team, as well as the Magpie Army, his story is one that will be recognised for years to come.

“When I was transitioning out of footy it was almost like a grieving stage for me and leaving that behind and not knowing who I was as a person and just not understanding the feelings and emotions that came with that,” he says.

“Being a guy, you don’t really talk about that with other fellas, you bottle up other feelings and emotions.

“I feel like that time has been awesome just to grow and become a better person, partner, father for my puppy, a better son.

“As much as I’m really grateful for everyone around me and my journey I’m also really proud of myself.

“Who would’ve thought 12 months ago to now would be happening.”