Jack Ansell is a step closer to realising his dream of playing American football at the highest level.
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The Warrnambool-raised punter, fresh off finishing his third and final US college season with Purdue University, has been invited for a workout with NFL outfit Indianapolis Colts in early April.
The 26-year-old is also hoping to meet with other teams before the NFL draft from April 25-27.
Should he impress with his skills, a professional contract is a real possibility.
"I think it's definitely a good chance," he told The Standard.
"They don't really mess around with wasting time bringing people in if they don't see something in them and obviously myself I believe I can play at the next level.
"I think it'll be a good chance to just show my skills again. It's all a result of a lot of the hard work I've put in so I'm not particularly stressed about it, I'm just going to go in and do my thing and if it works out, it works out and that's great.
"No matter what happens I'll put my best foot forward with the future."
The Colts' interest in Ansell comes after he impressed at Purdue's Pro Day - an annual event college's host where footballers not invited to the official combine have a chance to showcase their skills to NFL scouts and staff.
Ansell said that participating in a Pro Day was a more common way for specialist players, like punters, to be noticed than at the combine.
As for his chances in the draft, he said teams usually preferred to acquire punters in a different manner.
"Teams don't generally like to use their draft picks on special teams players just because there are minimums with contracts if you get drafted," he said.
"It being one of the less-utilised positions, given that teams obviously don't want to punt, they tend to just use their draft picks to just fill all their skill position players and they'll pick up a lot of the specialists as un-drafted free agents."
Ansell averaged 40.7 yards from 60 punts last season with the Boilermakers, the longest of which was a mammoth 65 yards.
In three seasons he punted 158 times at an average of 40.4 yards per punt - which ranks him eighth in both statistics across the program's history.
The Prokick Australia product knows the opportunity to train at world-class NFL facilities is a golden one, whether it lands him a contract or not.
"It'll be just good to get around the NFL facilities and be where a lot of great players have been before, even if it doesn't go further than that," he said.
"You've sort of rubbed shoulders with some of the NFL greats who've gone through the Colts and other teams so it's a true honour to be invited in and take every chance given to you and do the best with the cards you've been dealt."
In the meantime, some of the punter's focus will go towards wedding planning after he and his American girlfriend Ally were engaged on New Year's Eve.
The couple live happily in Indiana where Ansell has just started a job at an insurance brokerage and Ally works as an occupational therapist.
Matt Hughes
Matt is a sports journalist at The Standard.
Matt is a sports journalist at The Standard.
