Ox: Why I’m worried about Melbourne in 2026

Melbourne endured an off-field of significant change after a tough 2025 season.

The Demons earlier parted ways with premiership coach Simon Goodwin before star midfielders Christian Petracca and Clayton Oliver, and talented half-back Judd McVee, all left the club.

New senior coach Steven King has a massive job on his hands to get the Demons up and going again but it won’t be in 2026, according to club great David Schwarz.

The 173-game, 243-goal best and fairest Dee just cannot see them improving on 2025’s seven wins and 14th-placed finish.

Schwarz was asked: Do you see them rising or falling in 2026?

“Falling. They’ve lost three good players,” the Ox told SEN WA Breakfast.

“McVee is a good player, and then you lose Oliver and Petracca. So are you going to be able to replace them? Not a chance. You’re not going to replace the two of them anyway.

“You’ve got a new coach, a new game plan, a pretty inexperienced coaching panel.

“I’m a bit worried about Melbourne. If they can hold 10th to 12th I think that’s a good result, but they may slip down to 14th, 15th or 16th maybe.”

The Demons also lost Charlie Spargo to North Melbourne in the trade period.

They did bring in Brody Mihocek from Collingwood, Changkuoth Jiath from Hawthorn, Jack Steele and Max Heath from St Kilda, while adding father-son prospect Kalani White and selecting Xavier Taylor and Latrelle Pickett in the first round of the draft.

From 11:18

2 minutes ago, Demonland said:

Ox: Why I’m worried about Melbourne in 2026

Melbourne endured an off-field of significant change after a tough 2025 season.

The Demons earlier parted ways with premiership coach Simon Goodwin before star midfielders Christian Petracca and Clayton Oliver, and talented half-back Judd McVee, all left the club.

New senior coach Steven King has a massive job on his hands to get the Demons up and going again but it won’t be in 2026, according to club great David Schwarz.

The 173-game, 243-goal best and fairest Dee just cannot see them improving on 2025’s seven wins and 14th-placed finish.

Schwarz was asked: Do you see them rising or falling in 2026?

“Falling. They’ve lost three good players,” the Ox told SEN WA Breakfast.

“McVee is a good player, and then you lose Oliver and Petracca. So are you going to be able to replace them? Not a chance. You’re not going to replace the two of them anyway.

“You’ve got a new coach, a new game plan, a pretty inexperienced coaching panel.

“I’m a bit worried about Melbourne. If they can hold 10th to 12th I think that’s a good result, but they may slip down to 14th, 15th or 16th maybe.”

The Demons also lost Charlie Spargo to North Melbourne in the trade period.

They did bring in Brody Mihocek from Collingwood, Changkuoth Jiath from Hawthorn, Jack Steele and Max Heath from St Kilda, while adding father-son prospect Kalani White and selecting Xavier Taylor and Latrelle Pickett in the first round of the draft.

From 11:18

No one's mentioned Tracc and Clarry leaving on here. Any new thoughts? 🙄

13 minutes ago, Go Ds said:

No one's mentioned Tracc and Clarry leaving on here. Any new thoughts? 🙄

Thanks mate, nice laugh before bedtime.

I’m not overly worried, I think we are in a rebuild of sorts, maybe not to the level of Richmond but certainly aren’t going for a premiership.

I’m excited for the season and excited to see changes, hopefully it goes well and even if we bottom out to 14th of 15th, I’ll be happy to see that if we are actually clearly making game changes and playing exciting football.

Comparatively, we have been stagnant for 4 years with the same game style and we are still bottoming out, so really it can really only get better in my humble opinion.

Go Dees.

Who cares. No one else is “worried”; I’m certainly not.

it’s a clean out that had to happen for the greater good. Simple.

Zero expectations from me, I just want to enjoy going to the football again. Hopefully King brings that with a good brand, win or lose.

Pack of half empty pessimists - half full (or even nearly full) optimists needed.

Apply to this board.

Of course we are likely to fall. We just sacked a Premiership winning coach and cleared out our two best midfielders in the past 30 years. We have also brought in some mature talent to help hold the fort for a year or two, and added even more quality young players to go with those already playing good footy. The point was to bleed a bit now to avoid falling into a pit.