Here’s one reason why they should build a statue outside Kardinia Park for Stephen Wells, Geelong’s long-time head of recruiting.

Wells found Corey Enright at Kimba, not so far from the Nullarbor, and chose him with pick 47 in the 1999 national draft. He was 17, playing for Kimba Tigers, and a champion in the making.

Wells is a genius of his craft and Enright may well be his best-ever nugget, although there has been plenty of gold along the way (including a Norm Smith medallist in Paul Chapman at a cheap pick 31 in the same draft).

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Twice the club champion in premiership years (2007 and 2009), Enright logs 300 games against Melbourne on Sunday and will be feted, as he should be.

As is his wont, he will likely bow his head and shy away from the attention.

It hasn’t all been smooth sailing for Corey Enright. Photo: Getty

Here is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma, to quote Churchill, for Corey Enright has never been a Footy Show type of guy.

He is not widely known by the public, in the truest sense of the world, albeit that he is universally respected as being the best back pocket player in the game.

He might be the best ever, but I’ll get to that.

All week I have seen people in the game shift uncomfortably as they try to describe Enright, many of them struggling for the words that match the gravity of the occasion. The closest has been Harry Taylor, part of that great Geelong defence, who called him the sunrise.

Writing in The Age, Taylor described his teammate as “a bright breath of light that wakes you up and gets you in a good mood”.

We all know these kind of people, the ones who are always there for you, always doing the right thing, covering your back.

In Corey Enright’s case, you add the fact he has elite skill at his job and a great team-first mindset and you can see why he is a five-time All-Australian and a three-time premiership player, a remarkable eight times in the top five of Geelong’s best and fairest in the club’s most successful era.

Watch him closely and you see a seriously great reader of the play, a man who knows the precise moment to leave his opponent and attack.

He is a wicked ball-user and peerless decision-maker.

Always a fine one-on-one defender, his modus operandi is nevertheless mostly attacking; it is how he has become to be known, for setting up forward thrusts, moreso than stopping the opposition, for Geelong in Enright’s time was never content to merely contain the other team.

Gavin Wanganeen started in the back pocket, but was moved on to the ball. Photo: Getty

Enright was never dour and in this he epitomised Geelong.

In fact, winning became second nature to him; he has played in 198 wins in his 299 games, a two-to-three ratio in a game designed and contrived to be 50-50.

These are no mere coincidences.

The best ever back pocket player? Now there’s a big statement, but it’s worth pondering.

I put this to a friend the other day and he immediately threw back the names of Chris Johnson, Brisbane Lions’ triple premiership defender, and Brownlow medallist Gavin Wanganeen, who was outrageously good out of the back pocket for Essendon around 1993 – a gymnast in red and black.

Both are unequivocally great players, and I also pointed out that Bernie Smith won a Brownlow out of a back pocket for Geelong in the 1950s and Brad Hardie did, too, for Footscray in the 1980s.

Another Geelong 300-gamer, Ian Nankervis, was regarded as a champion back pocket.

I never saw Bernie Smith play. As for Hardie, Wanganeen and Johnson, they all played big chunks of their career elsewhere.

Johnson was a half-forward until Leigh Matthews decided otherwise; Wanganeen became an on-baller at Port Adelaide as he should have, and Hardie ran everywhere chasing a kick, ending up as a forward.

Corey Enright is in their league, at the very least.

What is more, Enright started in the back pocket, and stayed there.

When the game changed, and defenders were required to attack, it fitted him perfectly.

The kid from Kimba started out wearing No. 44, and never deigned to change; never thought it necessary to take up what might have been a more dignified number on his back.

Back in the town of Kimba, population 600-odd, where he used to disappear yabbying with his mates, they created an ‘Enright Street’ in his honour.

Corey Enright, take a bow.