IT WAS supposed to be a normal Tuesday ahead of the AFLW's season opener.
There was meant to be game planning, a bit of opposition analysis, some high-performance work in the gym, the club's main training session at Gosch's Paddock, and then team selection over dinner later that night.
But on an emotion-charged afternoon at AAMI Park, the day took a turn. Tears were shed, dreams came to fruition, a family grew bigger, and the spirit that sparked Melbourne's meteoric rise to last season's premiership came to the fore.
AFL.com.au was granted exclusive access as the Demons went through their final preparations ahead of Friday night's blockbuster clash with the Magpies. But what was set up to be a routine final day of pre-season training soon became anything but.
Demon Spirit
IT ALL starts with Ron.
Ron is the father of Melbourne midfielder Sammie Johnson, and on Tuesday he arrives at AAMI Park cradling his new grandson Luca. Unbeknownst to him, Ron is about to be crowned that week's Demon Spirit winner.
The club's weekly Demon Spirit award has been a long tradition at Melbourne. First introduced by coach Mick Stinear and former captain Daisy Pearce, it recognises and celebrates an individual who displays the trademark values of Melbourne's AFLW program.
It normally goes to a player or staff member, and it normally salutes their work ethic either on game day or on the training track. Quite clearly, though, Ron fits neither of those categories. His contribution has been unique, but just as special.
A couple of weeks ago, Johnson – who has only recently been moved back to the club's active list, having welcomed her newborn son in April this year – got word that Melbourne's Irish sisters Blaithin and Aimee Mackin had moved into a new apartment.
Aimee had only just relocated to Australia, and the sisters were still searching for a few household essentials at their new place. So, Johnson asked her father Ron if there was any way he could help out.
Without hesitation Ron parted with his own washing machine and dryer, making what Blaithin describes as a "40 or 50-minute drive" across town to both deliver and install them himself. He even offered to lend the sisters his car to help them get to training.
With Father's Day approaching this weekend, and with the Irish sisters having left their tightknit family at home to make the daunting trip across the world to play footy in Australia, their gratitude to Ron could not have been clearer as they gave an emotional speech thanking him for his selflessness and generosity.
"It's a family for us," Melbourne skipper Kate Hore tells AFL.com.au.
"We talk about our Demon Spirit a lot and how we help and support one another. Our families are such an extension of that. To be able to bring Sammie's dad in and acknowledge what he's done for our team and what he did for our Irish girls, it's just incredible. It's important to be able to celebrate that as well."
The winner of the Demon Spirit award usually gets 'moshed' as their prize, another Melbourne tradition. On a normal day, that would mean being lifted up by teammates and crowd-surfing across the room to a song of your choice. That was a Daisy idea.
"She thought long and hard about it and then she just said, 'I've always just wanted to be moshed in a group of people'," Hore laughs. "It was all based on this incredible reward that she wanted. So, yeah, now you just get moshed if you win."
But, with Ron still holding baby Luca, Melbourne's players opt for a chant instead.
"Ron! Ron! Ron!"
Living by Daisy's standards
IT ALL feels the same at Melbourne, even if it is different.
For the first time in the program's history, it enters this season as the AFLW's reigning premiers. But for the first time in the program's history, it also enters this season without its inspirational leader Daisy Pearce.
Pearce bowed out on top last season, retiring as the club's first ever AFLW premiership captain. She departed having left a lasting legacy as one of the competition's most influential and recognisable figures.
But even though Pearce is no longer at Melbourne, and even though she is now representing an entirely different club as part of Geelong's coaching setup, the Demons aren't entirely acting like it. Instead, they're embracing what Pearce has left. Her legacy is being honoured by the fact Melbourne's players are choosing to live by her standards.
"It's not denying the fact that Daisy's no longer playing with us and no longer in the program, but really learning from a lot of the knowledge that she's imparted and her way of going about it," Stinear tells AFL.com.au.
"Take all of the learnings and use it to work hard and get success. Learn from it and step into the space she's created for us to then move the program forward and put it in a better place for the next person. What it does do, when prominent people like that step away, is it creates opportunity for others to step up."
Hore has done that, and then some. Arguably the League's most influential on-field performer, the 28-year-old is just as impressive – if not more – in her newfound role as the club's captain.
Those at the Demons believe there is a balance to Hore's nature that is reminiscent to that of Pearce. She is calm, yet demanding. Funny, yet incredibly serious about building a successful program. Much like they did for Pearce, those traits make for an influential and relatable captain.
"She's someone that's always had a really good handle on her own preparation and performance and training standards and behaviours," Stinear says. "Now, she's been able to extend that out and positively influence those around her and continue to grow her connection and influence with others.
"The best thing, when you've got leaders like that, is that it's not forced. They're not exhausted because they're trying to be someone they're not. Kate can just be her genuine, authentic self. Her teammates love her for it and respond and get inspired accordingly."
Hore, like the club's ethos as a whole, has taken inspiration from what Pearce left behind.
"I just think about how fortunate I was to be able to learn from her," she says.
"Being the vice-captain to Daisy last year, I was just a sponge to everything that she did and said. A lot of what I bring, I've learnt from Daisy. But I also have to bring my own flair to it as well and just keep being genuine and authentic.
"As a leader, I think that's the best thing you can do. Just be yourself. There's no point me going out there trying to be Daisy, because I'm not and I never will be and I would fail miserably at doing that. I just have to go out and be Kate and hopefully that's good enough."
Where it starts
IT CAN still be stressful to watch.
"I don't want to do that ever again," Hore laughs.
In the final painstaking moments of last season's AFLW Grand Final, with Melbourne leading Brisbane by just four points, the Demons swung a change they had been preparing for months.
Stinear moved Hore into the backline and watched anxiously as the game's premier forward suddenly morphed into its best intercepting defender, for just a few moments at least. It proved the most decisive tactical switch of the match, as the Demons spearhead thwarted wave after wave of Lions attacks to help her side cling to victory.
"It's something that we had practised a lot in our pre-season," Hore says.
"We do heaps of scenario-based training. Whether we practise being five points down or five points up, it's about how we can change the game. It was actually pretty cool to see that come into a match, something that we'd practised all season."
Indeed, on Tuesday, similar types of strategies and contingencies are worked through meticulously. After a gruelling off-season, it was Melbourne's final marker before round one and the long-debated gameplan for Collingwood was being finalised.
The players started the day breaking into three groups to filter through defensive clips with assistant Dale Amos, midfield vision with Matt Brewer, and offence strategy with Shae Sloane and Vincent Chungue.
Afterwards, the playing group completed strength and conditioning work in the gym while the coaching group met to plan. It was here where the finer details in the crucial preparations for Friday night's blockbuster were completed.
The coaches collaborate methodically on schemes to help combat Collingwood's best players, sketch out scenario-based drills they will later train in the wet and windy conditions at Gosch's Paddock, and debate the specifics that could ultimately define the contest at Ikon Park.
Later, after the club's 90-minute main session, players split into smaller groups to refine elements of their roles with a series of assistant coaches. It's here where Sloane, in particular – having played one game for Melbourne in 2019, before transitioning into coaching – has been crucial in the development of several players across recent months.
The sister of former Adelaide's men's captain Rory, Sloane has been credited for young ruck Georgia Campbell's improvement this pre-season. After helping to support the father-daughter prospect in setting out her week and taking ownership of her career, Campbell has excelled to the point where she has been named to add to her one senior game on Friday night.
"It's the same approach you want from the players," Stinear says of his deputies.
"The collaboration is really important, because you want the coaches to feel like it's a place they're valued and they're having an impact. Our coaches do a fantastic job of role modelling the behaviours that we want to see in our players."
The culture king
"IT CAN be a bit of a fluffy word, can't it?"
Hore is talking about 'culture'. At Melbourne, she's not quite sure how to describe it.
Perhaps it's best depicted by revisiting stages of last year, when the AFLW landscape was suddenly gripped by a feeling of anxiety as four new expansion teams entered the competition and started pillaging rival lists of their existing talent.
Everyone lost players to expansion. Well, almost everyone. Melbourne didn't.
"It's such an important thing, to make a footy club an environment where people want to come to and want to stay involved in. We do a really good job of creating that sense of belonging for our girls," Hore says.
"It doesn't matter what happens on the track or what happens on game day, as long as they come here and be themselves. We really celebrate individuality and everyone brings their own unique personality to this group. We've got so many different types of people, but that's the best part about it. Mick and Daisy have obviously led that from day one."
Since the AFLW's inception back in 2017, Stinear has been the glue that has held the Demons together. That is overwhelmingly evident on Tuesday, where the entire playing group clearly feels empowered to display elements of their own personalities.
Whether that culminates in young defender Charlotte Wilson asking detailed questions about snippets of vision being presented by an assistant coach, or experienced midfielder Lily Mithen leading a group singalong to Missy Higgins' 'Scar' after a team dinner, it's all done with the backing and the support of Stinear.
"Where do you start?" Hore replies when asked to describe Stinear's impact.
"Mick's an amazing leader of our footy club. He just genuinely cares about every single person in this group. He genuinely wants people to succeed and get the best out of people. He's such a teacher in the way he goes about it. He's just an incredible man and we're very, very lucky to have him."
For Stinear, though, arguably the biggest satisfaction comes not from how that culture translates on the field. Instead, it's how Demon Spirit – as it is known around AAMI Park – is instilled into his players as people, in all walks of life.
"It extends way beyond our program," Stinear says.
"It just doesn't exist if we're a program for six months of the year and you're only team-first and you're only selfless for those six months, or even within your contact hours in the program.
"That's probably where we were thinking we were getting it right, but ultimately we were coming up short. We've made this transition and this realisation that if we want to be genuine and authentic with it, then it's a way of life. It's how you conduct yourself in the club, away from the club, on game day, in your off-season.
"Demon Spirit is who we are, it's how we act and behave. We genuinely care for others and support them. We're prepared to do the little things consistently when no one is watching. It all just adds up."
Welcome back
THE MOST emotional moment is saved for last on Tuesday.
As the team gathers in the kitchen over dinner, having completed their final day of pre-season training, Stinear steps forward to announce the 21 players that will run out in Friday night's AFLW season opener against Collingwood at Ikon Park.
Only he's not alone. Chris and Celia McNamara, the parents of young winger Eliza, will be joining him.
McNamara's story is a remarkable one. Last July the 21-year-old was completing a gym set she had done countless times, holding a barbell with 60kgs of weights behind her head. But this time, her ankle gave way underneath.
That weight landed on her back and neck, resulting in a compression fracture in her L1 vertebra, another fracture in her T12 vertebra, neural damage and internal bleeding. Forget about football, McNamara had to learn how to walk again.
Now, little more than a year after that traumatic accident, Chris and Celia – met with barely a single dry eye among Melbourne's playing group – would be announcing that their daughter was playing on Friday night.
"You don't really think about it all that much because she is so no-fuss and she just gets on with the job and doesn't really make a big deal about what she's actually been through and what she's overcome in the last 12 months," Hore says.
"But then, a moment like that, it just puts it all into perspective. Like, she might not have been able to walk again. And now she's about to run out in a season opener against Collingwood on a Friday night. It's just epic.
"Honestly, what she's been through in the last 12 months, it's hard to put into words. It makes me so proud to be part of this team. It's one of those moments where you sit back and go, wow. I'm so fortunate to be involved in this program."
Chris, choking back tears, describes his brief attempts to convince McNamara to step away from football in the days after her operation. Celia then speaks eloquently about sitting in hospital and having to broach the topic of Melbourne potentially challenging for a premiership that season, and how that would feel for McNamara to miss out on such an achievement.
Both do their utmost to express their thanks to physio Mitch Walker for the dedication he put into McNamara's recovery, their immense gratitude to the playing group for helping her feel part of their journey, while describing their joy at seeing their daughter involved in the celebrations when the final siren sounded in Springfield last November.
"It was tough," Stinear says.
"Eliza is just a competitor. She's got a really strong connection to the whole team. But she did an amazing job. We brought her in closer, working the player phone on the bench. Often, she became a bit of a player whisperer during the games. She would help the players navigate the challenges of game day.
"A lot of last year was about chatting it through and making sure she understood that she didn't need to be perfect. It was OK to experience the emotions and feelings of going through something for the first time and something not a lot of people have been through."
But the best way to make amends for McNamara not being part of Melbourne's premiership team last season? Winning it again this year. For the Demons, that journey to climb the mountain again starts on Friday night, with McNamara, Ron and everyone else who is part of this special group providing the motivation.
"There's no doubt, Eliza is spurred on to be part of a premiership team," Stinear says. "That will have a ripple effect throughout the playing group as well, to create an opportunity where they can share that with her."
