Demonland

Here is a photoshop of what Luke Jackson could potentially look like in a Dees guernsey.

And just like that, we’re Narrm again. Even though the annual AFL Sir Doug Nicholls Round which commemorates the contributions of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture to our game has been a welcome addition to our calendar for ten years, more lately it has been a portent of tough times ahead for we beleaguered Narrm supporters. Ever since the club broke through for its historic 2021 premiership, this has become a troubling time of the year for the club. For example, it all began when Melbourne rebranded itself as Narrm across the two rounds of the Sir Doug Nicholls Round to become the first club to adopt an Indigenous club name especially for the occasion. It won its first outing under the brand against lowly North Melbourne to go to 10 wins and no losses but not without a struggle or a major injury to star winger Ed Langdon who broke his ribs and missed several weeks. In the following week, still as Narrm, the team’s 17 game winning streak came to an end at the hands of the Dockers. That came along with more injuries, a plague that remained with them for the remainder of the season until, beset by injuries, the Dees were eliminated from the finals in straight sets. It was even worse last year, when Narrm inexplicably lowered its colours in Perth to the Waalit Marawar Eagles. Oh, the shame of it all! At least this year, if there is a corner to turn around, it has to be in the direction of something better. To that end, I produced a special pre-game chant in the local Narrm language - “nam mi:wi winnamun katjil prolin ambi ngamar thamelin amb” which roughly translated is “every heart beats true for the red and the blue.” >y belief is that if all of the Narrm faithful recite it long enough, then it might prove to be the only way to beat the Brisbane Lions at the Gabba on Sunday. The Lions are coming off a disappointing draw at Marvel Stadium against a North Melbourne team that lacks the ability and know how to win games (except when playing Melbourne). Brisbane are, however, a different kettle of fish at home and have very few positional weaknesses. They are a midfield powerhouse, strong in defence and have plenty of forward options, particularly their small and medium sized players, to kick a winning score this week after the sting of last week’s below par performance. This is in contrast to Narrm’s shortcomings which were exposed so clearly last week against Hawthorn when, despite holding the advantage in general play for three quarters, it folded like a pack of cards in the end with half a dozen players contributing absolutely nothing to the team effort. And I mean “effort.” The fans are sick and tired of watching opposition defenders intercepting kicks from downfield with consummate ease. Sick of players not chasing or tackling inside forward fifty. The offenders have to be culled and replaced with players who have enough pride in themselves or their jumper to effectively play out their roles in the team. There is however, no cavalry of top line players to immediately replace them and some untried players will need to stand up along with some of the club’s promising you and the experienced hands like the skipper and Tracc. It all points to a Brisbane victory. I expect the Lions to run the game out comfortably by 40 points after a close battle until the 27 minute mark of the third quarter, at which time I will be silently chanting these words in my head top myself - “nam mi:wi winnamun katjil prolin ambi ngamar thamelin amb”. THE GAME Brisbane Lions v Narrm at The Gabba, Sunday 18 May 2025 at 3.20pm HEAD TO HEAD * Overall Brisbane Lions 26 wins Narrm 30 wins At The Gabba Brisbane Lions 16 wins Narrm 9 wins Last Five Meetings Brisbane Lions 4 wins Narrm 1 win The Coaches Fagan 6 wins Goodwin 8 wins * does not include Brisbane Bears or Fitzroy games LAST TIME THEY MET Brisbane Lions 11.20.86 defeated Narrm 11.15.81 at The Gabba, Round 16 2024 The Demons’ proved that they could play football with a dominant eight goal second quarter on the Gabba. It still wasn’t enough and they succumbed to the fast finishing Lions, courtesy of a goal from the boundary line after Alex Neal-Bullen gave away a free kick late in the game. THE TEAMS (to be loaded when available) BRISBANE LIONS NARRM Injury List: Round 10 Jack Billings — calf / available Jake Lever — ankle / available Jake Melksham — soreness / available Ricky Mentha — concussion / Test Harrison Petty — concussion / Test Taj Woewodin — ankle / Test Jack Viney — concussion / 1 - 2 weeks Marty Hore — calf / 3 - 4 weeks Shane McAdam — Achilles / next season Andy Moniz-Wakefield — knee / next season

I was just getting him back for mispronouncing my surname when he interviewed me for Channel 10 news 29 years ago.

I believe that I did spell it that way in my notes.

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That's because I had just got over a migraine and didn't want to do or say anything that might make it return.

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Apologies. Skype is no more. It has moved on to Microsoft Teams and the number will work until I run out of credit but unfortunately there is no way to leave a voicemail any more. Also apologies because I saw this late after putting together the questions and the run sheet. Great points. Please ask some of them in the weeks to come. I'm sure these same issues will be present unfortunately.

Melbourne gave Brisbane a real run for its money and led for most of the night until the last minute or two when ANB gave away a free kick for deliberate out of bounds and the Lion’s kick from an angle naturally went through the middle. Kozzy Pickett with five goals was irrepressible. MELBOURNE 1.5.11 9.7.61 11.11.77 11.15.81 BRISBANE LIONS 3.7.25 5.8.38 8.14.62 11.20.86 GOALS MELBOURNE Pickett 5 Van Rooyen 2 Chandler Fritsch Oliver Turner BRISBANE LIONS Cameron Daniher Rayner 2 Ah Chee Berry Hipwood Lohmann McLuggage BEST MELBOURNE Pickett Viney Oliver van Rooyen Petty Rivers BRISBANE LIONS McCluggage Neale Dunkley Hipwood Starcevich Zorko THE TEAMS BRISBANE LIONS B D. Zorko, D. Joyce, R. Lester HB C. McKenna, H. Andrews, B. Starcevich C Z. Bailey, C. Rayner, J. Berry HF C. Cameron, E. Hipwood, H. McCluggage F C. Ah Chee, J. Daniher, L. Morris FOLL O. McInerney, J. Dunkley, L. Neale I/C W. Ashcroft, K. Lohmann B. Reville, D. Wilmot SUB J. Fletcher EMG S. Brain, D. Fort, D. Robertson IN W. Ashcroft, D. Joyce OUT S. Brain (omitted), J. Payne (foot) MELBOURNE B J. Lever, S. May, J. McVee HB A. Moniz-Wakefield, A. Tomlinson, T. Rivers C A. Neal-Bullen, C. Windsor, K. Tholstrup HF K. Chandler, H. Petty, E. Langdon F K. Pickett, B. Fritsch, J. Van Rooyen FOLL M. Gawn, J. Viney, C. Oliver I/C T. McDonald, T. Sparrow, D. Turner, T. Woewodin SUB K. Brown EMG M. Jefferson, B. Laurie IN J. Lever, A. Moniz-Wakefield, S. Woewodin OUT K. Brown (omitted), B. Howes (omitted), C. Salem (knee)

There was a time during the current Melbourne cycle that goes back to before the premiership when the club was the toughest to beat in the fourth quarter. The Demons were not only hard to beat at any time but it was virtually impossible to get the better them when scores were close at three quarter time. It was only three or four years ago but they were fit, strong and resilient in body and mind. Sadly, those days are over. This has been the case since the club fell off its pedestal about 12 months ago after it beat Geelong and then lost to Carlton. In both instances, Melbourne put together strong, stirring final quarters, one that resulted in victory, the other, in defeat. Since then, the drop off has been dramatic to the point where it can neither pull off victory in close matches, nor can it even go down in defeat gallantly. In 2025, it has outscored the opposition in one final term (by three points against winless West Coast). One can only describe that as “catastrophic.” The statistics are there for all to see— Saturday’s capitulation to Hawthorn was typical of the season to date. When this game was there to be won at three quarter time, the Hawks dominated with precision football that cut the Demons defence to shreds outscoring them by 41 points to 7 to turn what had hitherto been a close contest into a rout. The team’s much vaunted defensive powerhouse status has been affected by the fact that it has not once this year seen the May/Lever combination in action - the sooner we see the return of the latter, the better because the Demons need the direction and steadiness of the combination to steady the ship before it sinks altogether. One can’t, of course, blame only the defence for leaking that much in the final term of an otherwise closely fought contest. The fact is that after a tightly fought opening term, Melbourne failed to take advantage of its territorial advantage in the second and third quarters by squandering opportunity after opportunity. The Demons’ attack remains largely impotent and the magic of the once deadly midfield was blunted this week without Jack Viney and with Clayton Oliver well below his brilliant best of days gone by. The other factor that needs to be addressed is the squad’s fitness, whether that be linked to its physical or mental condition, or both. It surely isn’t totally coincidental that the team’s VFL counterpart lost its game by 18 points earlier in the day after holding a 26 point lead well into time on in the third quarter. Whatever the cause, there’s no easy or quick fix on the horizon. It wasn’t all gloom and doom for a team that led a major premiership contender just four minutes before the last break and, but for an inaccurate second quarter, coulda, woulda, shoulda been far further ahead at the time. Unfortunately, poor execution in front of goal (not to mention the umpires tripping themselves up over a tripping offence to Kozzie Pickett) robbed them of the chance to really challenge the Hawks at the end with some scoreboard pressure. Max Gawn was great as usual, although not as prolific as in previous games, Kozzie and Tracc were strong in the contests as usual, but the real bright spots were the form of top draft picks Harvey Langford and Caleb Windsor, who demonstrated the shape of things to come. They might be young, but they are the sounder of mind and body than most of their more experienced teammates. Their endeavour and application put several of them to shame. MELBOURNE 2.3.15 4.10.34 6.13.49 7.14.56 HAWTHORN 3.3.21 5.5.35 7.8.50 13.13.91 GOALS MELBOURNE Langford 3 Pickett 2 Sharp Sparrow HAWTHORN Gunston 3 Chol Watson 2 Breust Ginnivan Meek Moore Ward Weddle BEST MELBOURNE Langford Bowey Gawn Pickett Petracca McDonald HAWTHORN Worpel Jiath Gunston Sicily Ward Weddle D’Ambrosio INJURIES MELBOURNE Nil HAWTHORN Nil REPORTS MELBOURNE Nil HAWTHORN Nil SUBSTITUTIONS MELBOURNE Koltyn Tholstrup replaced Matt Jefferson in the third quarter HAWTHORN Bailey Macdonald replaced Henry Hustwaite at half-time UMPIRES Matt Stevic Cameron Dore Jordan Fry James Strybos CROWD 50,351 at The MCG

At twenty-four minutes into the third term of the game between the Casey Demons and Footscray VFL at Whitten Oval, the visitors were coasting. They were winning all over the ground, had the ascendancy in the ruck battles and held a 26 point lead on a day perfect for football. What could go wrong? Everything. The Bulldogs moved into overdrive in the last five minutes of the term and booted three straight goals to reduce the margin to a highly retrievable eight points at the last break. Bouyed by that effort, their confidence was on a high level during the interval and they ran all over the despondent Demons and kicked another five goals to lead by a comfortable margin of four goals deep into the final term before Paddy Cross kicked a couple of too late goals for a despondent Casey. A testament to their lack of pressure in the latter stages of the game was the fact that Footscray’s last ten scoring shots were nine goals and one rushed behind. Things might have been different for the Demons who went into the game after last week’s bye with 12 AFL listed players. Blake Howes was held over for the AFL game but two others, Jack Billings and Taj Woewodin (not officially listed as injured) were also missing and they could have been handy at the end. Another mystery of the current VFL system. Casey’s VFL contingent served the team well with Riley Baldi (25 touches), Mitch Hardie (24), Riley Bonner (20) and, Lachlan Bryce (19) were all prominent while the team was in the ascendancy and Cross contributed three of the team’s nine goals for the day. The rucks of Tom Campbell and his understudy Will Verrall were dominant for most of the game winning 41 and 14 hitouts respectively, the former finishing up with 21 possessions and 10 clearances. Verrall also had 12 disposals. Casey’s best was Bailey Laurie who had 27 disposals to go with his six clearances while Kynan Brown’s performance also pressed his claim for an AFL return with his 25 possessions, seven clearances and ten tackles. Forwards Tom Fullarton and Aidan Johnson contributed three and two goals respectively. Johnson’s former Werribee teammate Jack Henderson was effective with 23 disposals and Oliver Sestan continued to show his improvement, as did defenders Jed Adams and Luker Kentfield while Jai Culley also had his moments. The Demons return to Casey Fields next Saturday where they take on 2024 grand finalists, the Southport Sharks in what should be another tough battle. CASEY DEMONS 1.3.9 3.5.23 7.8.50 9.8.62 FOOTSCRAY VFL 2.2.14 3.6.24 6.6.42 12.8.80 GOALS CASEY DEMONS Cross Fullarton 3 Johnson 2 Hardie FOOTSCRAY VFL Hargraves 4 Kennedy 3 Crofts 2 Lewis Orgill Smith BEST CASEY DEMONS Laurie Campbell Henderson Cross Kentfield Sestan FOOTSCRAY VFL Duryea Smith Crofts Gardner Scott Jones