Trent Cotchin says Dustin Martin will be ‘completely scared’ entering life after AFL footy

Three-time Richmond premiership captain Trent Cotchin says his former teammate Dustin Martin will be both excited and apprehensive about life after AFL footy.

Martin shocked the AFL world by announcing his retirement, effective immediately, following the Tigers’ loss to North Melbourne in Round 21.

WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Trent Cotchin details what’s next for Dustin Martin.

No one except Martin himself knows what he will do next, but Cotchin has heard a rumour or two, as he explained on Talking Footy.

“I’ve heard reports that he might go and do some DJing with Fisher, but I don’t know how true that is,” Cotchin laughed, with an undertone of sincerity.

Having just been through the process of transitioning out of the game himself, Cotchin said it will be a somewhat daunting experience for his great mate.

“But I don’t know (what he will do),” Cotchin said on Channel 7.

“I think, having experienced it myself this year, you go into this whole new world that you don’t know. And for him to be curious about what interests him, finding purpose in a different way of life — I think it’s exciting for him.

“I’m sure there’s an element of him that’s completely s*** scared as well.”

Cotchin was there at Martin’s last game, but only by chance.

“Weirdly, I had just decided to take my youngest child, my son Parker, along to the game at Marvel, nice and close to home, and didn’t have any expectation that it was going to be the last time we saw Dustin Martin playing a game of AFL footy,” he said.

“So, it was sad to hear that news during the week, because I thought there’d be another opportunity to kind of send him off in a way that everyone thinks that he deserves to be.

“But seeing him at the ground and then after the match, he did make a gesture as though ‘that’s it, I’m done’. I took it as a bit of tongue in cheek.

“But now reflecting (on it), clearly he was carrying a pretty heavy weight.”

Speculation around Martin’s future in the game was rife for most of 2024, and went into overdrive since his 300th game in Round 14 against Hawthorn.

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The three-time Norm Smith medallist drew a crowd of over 92,000 to the MCG to see what would be his final AFL milestone.

After the game, the publicly mute enigma gave a rare interview with former teammate Jack Riewoldt where he spoke passionately about his love for the club.

But it didn’t completely dispel suggestions that he would leave Richmond to join former coach Damien Hardwick at Gold Coast for the twilight of his career.

The truth was no one knew what he would do but, in the end, Cotchin said it’s “not surprising” that Martin bowed out without affording himself a farewell game.

“Dusty’s always done it his way,” he said on Talking Footy.

“We spoke about in his 300th game, that would have been maybe an opportunity (to retire) and maybe the way he did present after the match like that, that could have been his last game.”