THE booing of Sydney Swans great Adam Goodes by certain members of the football public has surprised Paul Roos, who coached the dual premiership player and two-time Brownlow medallist for much of his career.

Roos said he couldn’t speak highly enough of Goodes, who is regarded as one of the game’s greats.

“It’s surprising. I’ve known Goodesy for years. He’s one of the nicest blokes you’re ever going to meet. He’s just an exceptional human being and I don’t know why it’s happening and you can tell Adam’s getting a bit frustrated,” he said.

“He’s given so much to football and his performance over many, many years [has been outstanding].

“When people run into me and say ‘I ran into Adam Goodes the other day’. They say ‘Geez, he’s a nice guy’. No one meets him and says anything bad about him, so it is disappointing.

“With Sydney the way they’re going and maybe he does play again [next year], but they’re having a terrific year and he might finish off with what he wants to finish off with [and that’s a premiership].”

Goodes came under the media spotlight for completing an Indigenous war cry against Carlton on Friday night, which has seen sparked debate publicly.

Against the Power at TIO Traeger Park in Alice Springs on Saturday, Demons Heritier Lumumba and Jeff Garlett completed their own versions. But Roos said he saw only saw Garlett’s and not Lumumba’s.

“I saw Jeff’s one, but I didn’t see ‘H’,” he said.

“Jeff Garlett had his family come down [to the club] and do some Indigenous dancing for us. I think we’ve seen on the weekend what it means to Indigenous players as well. Goodesy, Jeff and ‘H’ … it means a lot.

“[Being] part of a greater football community is learning about the culture, which is great and we learned a lot on Thursday about Jeff and his family from the dance, so it’s really positive and really important.”