By Guy Hand
November 27th 2009 @ 1:15am
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Demons rate their top two equally
If there was such a thing as an equal No.1 AFL draft pick, Melbourne would have used it, according to coach Dean Bailey.
While Victorian teenager Tom Scully will wear the label of No.1 in this year’s national draft, the Demons’ selection of South Australian midfielder Jack Trengove at No.2 gives both youngsters a shared pressure.
And Bailey admits he would have loved the pair to share equal billing, such is the club’s regard for the two youngsters the Dees added at the draft selection meeting on Thursday night.
“We couldn’t split them to be honest,” Bailey said.
“I would have liked to have been able to read both their names out at the same time.”
While few AFL fans have ever seen Dandenong Stingrays midfielder Scully play, all AFL fans will now know who he is.
Such is the attention afforded the No.1 pick.
But Scully goes into his first AFL season in the rare position of having the next pick in Sturt’s Trengove next to him, and the previous year’s No.1 draftee Jack Watts at the club and also developing.
Both Scully and Trengove were coy about setting the expectations bar too high and were measured about whether they could even figure in senior calculations next year.
“All that pressure is all external and I’m sure the club are understanding of the position Jack and I are in,” Scully said.
“Players come into the club and you start off the same. If you let that sort of stuff (the pressure of being the No.1 pick) get to you too much, it affects your football.
“But if you’re strong and you stick to the stuff you know, it shouldn’t affect you.”
Scully and Trengove have been bracketed as the top two draft picks for months.
But they have only briefly met earlier this year, though Trengove knows their link is now a career-long one.
“We’re going into the same club and … we’re going to have to earn some respect. The number doesn’t mean anything until you’re out there playing footy and showing how good you are,” Trengove said.
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