Marshall & Highmore likely to play, Demons debutant flag, Cunnington out
Rowan Marshall and Tom Highmore appear likely to play this round, Melbourne flagged a potential debutant while Ben Cunnington is set to be out indefinitely in a major shock.
UPDATES
Jake Bowey (AF $230k SC $117k M/F) looms as a rookie flag for Melbourne with some reports indicating he’ll play this round.
Melbourne coach Simon Goodwin said: “We’ve got a lot of guys starting to perform well, vandenBerg, Melksham, Jake Bowey & Sam Weideman is starting to come back into some form as well.”
Tom Highmore (AF $419k SC $331k DEF) is looking likely to return from a hand injury, especially with Jack Sinclair ruled to with a hamstring and Daniel McKenzie not yet clearing concussion protocol.
St Kilda coach Brett Ratten said: “Highmore trained really well actually, so it looks like we might get four back.”
Rowan Marshall (AF $584k SC $464k F/R) also looks likely to play despite being in isolation in Perth until Wednesday.
Ratten said: “I think he’ll be fine. It’s not like he hasn’t had the contact with everybody. He’s had a program to do. It’s quite unique but he’s a professional. He’ll make sure he gets up.”
Ben Cunnington (AF $775k SC $590k MID) looks set to miss with North Melbourne revealing he has had surgery after the discovery of a testicular tumour this week.
Carlton coach David Teague explained the reason for the change role of Matthew Kennedy (AF $594k SC $414k M/F) last round.
Teague said: “He was the other one who’s been playing quite well in the midfield & we asked him to play a role. We needed a couple of guys to play tall (up forward).”
On Patrick Cripps (AF $565k SC $424k MID), Teague added: “He missed the game against Collingwood with a sore foot but he felt good during the week. He’s a strong inside mid who hunts the footy. That’s when he’s at his best.”
TOMORROW
Chris Scott, Ben Rutten, Robert Harvey, Leon Cameron and David Noble are all due to speak to the media while we’ll learn the 22s for the weekend.
