IF IT were his choice, Daniel Giansiracusa would start every game on the ground. Most footballers would. His stomach would bubble with first-bounce emotions, he'd get an up-close sense of where the ball was trying to go and do what he could to make sure his side had the most emphatic early say.

This year, Giansiracusa has started each week on the bench, keeping warm and waiting. At first, this was because he'd had a knee injury, and needed to work up some match conditioning. These days, it's because it has simply seemed to work for him and his team.

It is also something he has grown to quite like. "It doesn't seem to bother me. I thought it might, I thought I'd much rather be on the ground, but I've come to actually enjoy it," he explained this week.

Sitting to the side, he has found himself feeling "a little less amped" at the start of each game, able to get a more clear-headed idea of its early patterns and to settle the teammates sitting beside him, most of whom are young and more than often feeling edgy.

"I've found that I can keep them going a bit, keep them focussed. At the start of the game, there can be a fair few nerves on the bench, and me constantly talking to the other guys there probably relaxes me a bit as well. When I get on, I'm feeling really ready to go.

"You can get a real feel for the game, as well, so you feel involved in it from the start anyway. If you know you're going into the midfield, you can look at the stoppages, watch how we're going with the contested footy and just get that sense of how a game is going.

"As a player, sometimes you can get so caught up in the emotion of a game that you don't know exactly what's happening in those first few minutes. On the bench, you're that step back from it and feeling a little less amped in the first few minutes, not so caught up in it all.

"You can figure out the things you need to do when you do get on the gound. You can come on with a pretty clear mind."

The bench has helped him to do other things, too. Giansiracusa has kicked 24 goals this year, and needs to slot just two more to beat his best tally, set six seasons ago. But where he once described himself as an almost full-time forward, he has become a much bigger part of his side's midfield mix this year. The Bulldogs have gotten bigger and tougher, been pushed around less easily and won more tough ball.

In a way, Giansiracusa has personified that. "I think we've changed as a team, but I've probably played more in the midfield than I ever have before, so that changes things as well," he said. "When you're in there, you need to do different things to when you're on the half-forward line, so it's probably just the role that's changed me.

"Part of it is development, though. I feel more comfortable on the field than I ever have before really, like I can handle all of the rigors that come with it. Last year and this year, I've just started to have that confidence and feel comfortable with my body, that it's strong enough to match it with the bigger guys.

"It's a funny thing, because you probably don't know what it's like to feel completely comfortable until you get there, until you do feel it. But in games I'm starting to notice it, that I'm not getting pushed off the ball like I once was. It's only really come to me in the last couple of years."

Being able to simply get on the ground has changed his mindset, too. Giansiracusa can still remember the day last December when he changed direction on the training track, felt his knee give way and walked off to be told that his anterior cruciate ligament had crumbled.

At first, that seemed impossible. "It was such an innocuous thing, the way it happened," he said. "And I wasn't even in much pain. I kept thinking, but there's no way it can be that."

It was, but it wasn't as bad as it could have been. In his first meeting with surgeon David Young, ostensibly to book himself in for a reconstruction, Giansiracusa was told to keep his leg in a brace for four weeks, that the ligament was frayed, not completely torn, and might heal of its own accord.

The 26-year-old had a wedding to get ready for, so his mind was easily pre-occupied, and the day before he married Kelly, shortly before Christmas, he was told his knee had scarred up well, that he probably wouldn't be missing a full season, and maybe no games at all.

The pair honeymooned in Koh Samui, he spent part of each day on the exercise bike in the resort gym, and while he never let himself contemplate too deeply what it would be like to be watching his team play right now, feels lucky to be a part of things, and more relaxed about life than he might have been.

"I was a bit tentative in the first training session back. I can remember that pretty well, changing direction the first few times and thinking 'what's going to happen here, has it really healed?' " he said.

"But it felt great, pretty much straight away, and I haven't had a problem with it so far. It's actually calmed me a bit. I think as players you can get so wound up and so stressed about footy, that the thought of having it taken away can give you a bit of perspective.

"It makes you want it more, for sure, but you also have a more relaxed feel and can enjoy your footy and think of things as a bonus. I'm not too stressed about it because I know how easily it could have gone the other way. If I'm able to be out there, I might as well enjoy myself."

He has done that during each week, too, although he has always been a light-hearted type. Teammate Ryan Hargrave recently described Giansiracusa (lovingly) as "like a smart-arse little schoolboy" when the pair first met nine years ago, and "Gia" finds it tough to argue. "Sometimes I might be a pest," he said. "Only sometimes. But it kind of gets me involved in things, to be upbeat, to be enthusiastic about things."

Hargrave had also noticed a trail of young players following Gia around - wanting to be around him and wanting to be like him - and while it's not something Giansiracusa feels too conscious of, he likes to be thought of as a leader and would like to do more of it. Whether it's him who takes over as captain should Brad Johnson ever run out of puff, or one of his teammates.

"I think Johnno will play until he's about 45 the way he's going, but it's something I do aspire to, the captaincy, and I've said before that if it's not me then I'd like to think I can help the next person it is, whether it's Robert Murphy or Ryan Griffen or Shaun Higgings," said Giansiracusa.

"Depending on what happens with Johnno, I might be too old by the time it comes around. But if I can help the next person to come through. I think that's all part of being a leader as well. Part of being a leader is being able to bounce things off other people, and to be someone that people can come to and use. I just hope that whoever is the next captain, I'm someone they feel can help them."