FORMER Carlton and Melbourne footballer Brock McLean is on the hunt for another premiership – and he believes Woorinen can be the perfect side to help him there.
McLean has played for Murray Football League side Tongala for the past two years.
When Tongala’s 2023 season ended in disappointing fashion, McLean was considering calling time on his football career at the age of 38.
But the draw of a country football club, and the chance for one more flag, was too enticing, debuting for Woorinen in last weekend’s loss to Kerang.
“Once footy season rolls around, I always get itchy feet again,” McLean said.
“While my body is still somewhat OK, I thought I’d take the chance to travel up and be a part of a country footy club again.
“It was a pretty long weekend last week, but I enjoyed being back out there and being amongst it.
“I’m paying for it a little bit at the moment, but it was good fun nonetheless.”
McLean’s time with Tongala overlapped with the breakout of the star who put the town on the map, AFL No.1 pick Harley Reid.
McLean said he was able to play a handful of games with the young gun in his two years at Tongala.
“It was pretty amazing watching Harley,” he said.
“He’d be running the full length of the ground and shrugging off three or four blokes.
“He’s slotted into the AFL perfectly and is almost doing some of that same stuff.
“Something I really enjoyed with Tongala was it was a young group I could impart my knowledge on, and (Tigers coach) Marcus (Demaria) said it was a pretty similar group at Woorinen.”
Nurturing the future generations of footballers and sharing his expertise is something McLean said he feels natural doing.
“That knowledge and experience is probably the biggest thing I can provide to the team,” he said.
“I’m no spring chicken any more, so my impact on the field isn’t going to be the same as it was 10 years ago.
“But I’m able to have a big impact with my voice, and my direction in the game.
“Being able to impart all the things I’ve learnt through my time, I’ve been playing football since I was six and at the highest level for 11 years, so I think I’ve got a fair bit of knowledge that I can impart.
“If that’s my gift to the footy club, then I’m happy.”
McLean was bullish about the real chance of helping Woorinen to their first senior flag since 2019.
“At Tongy, I’d been playing across the half-back line, but Marcus threw me straight into the midfield,” he said.
“It was straight into the fire against the reigning premiers on their home ground.
“I think a lot of their scores came from our turnovers – if we can clean up some of that decision making, I think we can really take it up to them.”The chance to bring McLean to the club had been on Woorinen’s radar for a number of years.
Demaria said he and the club had been trying to recruit McLean “for about five or six years”.
“The talk around town may have been that it was just someone that we’d gone out and got now, but we’d sort of had those conversations for a number of years,” he said.
“We’ve been able to get to know each other and build that bit of a connection through chatting about the club every year and negotiating.
“He’s always shown an interest in the club, asking how the boys were going each year, and is someone that is open and honest with everything, it’s been a really good fit.”
Demaria said the recruitment would benefit the club both on the field and off it.
“The process behind it has been to take a little bit of the heat off a guy like Jye Barry and release him that little bit more,” he said.
“With Brock being that inside, contested beast that we’ve been chasing, it helps us not need to have that heavy reliance on guys like Josh Domaille and Jye Barry.
“But from a club-wide perspective, we try to target a marquee player who has had that AFL or VFL experience, just to help impart their knowledge.
“That’s not only to our playing group, but to our coaching staff and everyone around the club.
“Obviously these guys play under coaches at the highest level, so they bring a great knowledge of the game.
“Having guys like Brock out on the ground and imparting their knowledge onto our players, we see that can assist to no end.”
