The speaker is 18 year-old Dillon Viojo-Rainbow, Carlton’s second selection of the 2014 NAB AFL draft and, off the top, the Blues’ first footballer of Uruguayan origin.
The Uruguayan connection can be sourced to Dillon’s biological father Richard, who divorced his mother Ambre when he was a kid. Dillon maintains a healthy relationship with Richard, stepmother Roxanna and stepbrother Fernando, but last night savoured the moment with his biological Mum, stepfather Jason Rainbow, brother Jordan, sisters Grace and Emerson and stepbrother Lachlan at the family home in Werribee.
That Jason was there to savour the moment was important to Viojo-Rainbow. “He’s been a father figure to me since I was seven years old,” he said.
“I was sitting on the couch with my stepdad and Mum and my siblings were all around me waiting for my name to be called. I was glad my stepfather was there to soak it up because he’s been a father figure to me since I was seven years old,” Viojo-Rainbow said.
“It was nerve-wracking, particularly because the draft threw up some massive spanners. Some players went earlier and some went later, so I was pretty much shaking. But when my name was called by Carlton at pick 28 we all went nuts, jumping and screaming . . . and I think it’s on film actually.”
A Geelong supporter for the most part, Viojo-Rainbow boasted a healthy relationship with one of Carlton’s recruiters (Michael Jordan) - “a bond which made me want to go to Carlton even more” as he put it, “and I’m just rapt to be there”.
Renowned as a good catch of the footy and blessed with a wicked left foot, Viojo-Rainbow was always going to capture the discerning recruiter’s eye.
To say that Viojo-Rainbow made 2014 count would be something of a gross understatement. In 12 TAC Cup appearances for the Jets, he featured amongst the best players on no fewer than 10 occasions and earned a healthy reputation as the quintessential model of consistency.
Viojo-Rainbow cut his football teeth at Bacchus Marsh, where the legendary Carlton Premiership full-forward Harry “Soapy” Vallence originally hailed. The football journey then took him to Hopper’s Crossing, then Western Jets and, now, to the home of the Blues – and he has in fellow 2014 draftee Clem Smith a friend he’s known from Under 15 Schoolboy Carnival days.
