Melbourne
Coach – Simon Goodwin
2024 –
Points For – 14th
Points Against – 8th
Top 5 Best and Fairest
1 – Jack Viney
2 – Max Gawn
3 – Alex Neal-Bullen
4 – Kysaiah Pickett
5 – Ed Langdon
2024 Rising Star Noms
Caleb Windsor (Rnd 8)
Ins – Tom Campbell, Aidan Johnson, Harvey Langford, Xavier Lindsay, Ricky Mentha Jnr, Harry Sharp
Outs – Angus Brayshaw, Ben Brown, Kyah Farris-White, Lachie Hunter, Alex Neal-Bullen, Josh Schache, Joel Smith, Adam Tomlinson
My Prediction
Listening to the radio and it seems a lot of people are predicting the Demons to be this years big improver. They will be fascinating this year, are they still a contender or has their moment passed? There is definitely a lot of interesting subplots and some very unhappy rumblings at this miserable outfit with two of their top three players trying to find their way out of the club. It doesn’t bode well but these are professional players in a professional team playing in the professional era, none of that should matter… right?
The backline is great. They were the one area of the field that met expectations last year. Lever and May generally manage the balance between attacking and defending as well as anyone in the league. They have some tall support in McDonald and then they get the run and drive both from Lever and May as well as their smalls in Salem, Rivers and McVee who has been a very good find. They need better support from the midfield.
The midfield reads very well on paper, Windsor was a great pick last year and Langdon appears to be high rated despite rarely impacting games. Petracca looked great in patches before almost dying and Oliver has been the gunniest of guns in the past. Jack Viney was their best midfielder last year and for the Demons to improve he needs to be further down the list. They need stellar seasons from Petracca and Oliver both of whom wanted out last year.
The forward line has been a disaster for a while now. There is talk of Petty playing back this year but I am going to assume that doesn’t last long. Despite van Rooyen looking every bit like the answer for this forward line, he is yet to really rip a game apart and they will be hoping this is the year. They have good smalls in Pickett (at least for this year), Fritsch and Tholstrup. The forward line has lacked cohesion and the delivery from the midfield has been a major issue.
The ruck is great but they certainly cant afford him to suddenly age, get injured or drop off the cliff. He is their best player and probably still the best ruck in the competition. The coach has won a premiership which has allowed him to stay in his job beyond when he should have. I think he is probably coaching in Adelaide next year.
It is very hard to write off a team that has Petracca, Gawn, Oliver, Lever and May running around. They have the talent to push into the top six and the attitude to finish bottom six. They played last year with zero hunger and I don’t know where they expect a change in attitude to come from. I think on talent alone they win 7-9 games. I cant predict them to play finals although they clearly could. I think they finish 9-11.
