North Melbourne Player Personnel Manager Scott Clayton has labelled the 2023 National Draft one “for the ages”.
This is because of the uniqueness of the first-round talent, given a handful will be selected out of either Tasmania or Queensland.
Colby McKercher, James Leake and Arie Schoenmaker are likely to be selected out of Tassie, while Jed Walter, Ethan Read and Jake Rogers are all tied to the Gold Coast Academy.
“It probably is (the best class of Tasmanian talent ever). To have three or so in the first group is outstanding,” Clayton told SEN Tassie.
“This is a draft for the ages, this one – given the Tasmanians as well as the Gold Coast Suns’ Academy guys.
“They’ve put a lot of work into their Academy and relocated guys from far north Queensland and they’ll have three taken in the first round.
“Here we are with a top 10 full of Tasmanians and Queenslanders.”
North Melbourne coach Alastair Clarkson met with likely top 10 draft pick Dan Curtin over the weekend, reportedly for multiple hours.
Clayton says Clarkson was in Perth for personal reasons and so it made sense for him to meet up with Curtin, who the Roos are still considering at picks two or three.
“Alastair was in Perth for a wedding so it was an obvious move. We’ve interviewed Curtin quite a few times and we’re considering every option,” he said.
“The first 10 or 12 players are very good and very even, beauty will be in the eye of the beholder.”
Clayton confirmed the Roos never put picks two and three on the table in any trade talks with West Coast for pick one.
“No, we never considered that. We certainly had a lot of conversations about pick one, but it was more a slide,” he said.
“Having a volume of picks when we’re rebuilding, on top of (George) Wardlaw, (Harry) Sheezel and others, we want to add another five or six so there’s no way we would have reduced our picks on that front.
“We were in the market and had a lot of conversations, but it never really evolved to be honest.”
The AFL’s National Draft gets underway tonight with live coverage on SEN.