NEW BREED OF BABY BOMBER

Ashley Browne

Dons’ eye to the future paying off as twin prodigies fulfil their destiny

In footy, when you know, you know. That’s how it was at Essendon from 2007-13 when Alwyn Davey was on the list as a pacy forward.

A bit like his older brother Aaron at Melbourne, Davey could turn on the jets and flick the magic switch to get the fans excited and his teammates going. He was a popular figure at Windy Hill. Davey was 22 when he was drafted by the Bombers, arriving in 2007 with his two-year-old twin boys, Alwyn jnr and Jayden, in tow.

You often hear of young men and women whose love of the game was spawned growing up in the changerooms of a football club, smelling the liniment and kicking a ball around for hours at a time.

That might often be hyperbole, but it was 100 per cent true for the Davey twins.

“They did grow up at the footy club because ‘Froggy’ (Davey snr) would bring them everywhere,” long-time list manager Adrian Dodoro recalled.

“He’d just bring them in … it was actually quite funny, a lot of times he would just drop the kids off while he was having a massage or doing some rehab and the kids always had a footy in their hands.

“At the old Windy Hill training venue where our offices were, we’d look down on to the indoor area and the kids were incredible.

“They’d have their Essendon jumpers on, they’d have their footy and they would kick the ball for hours to each other – and we were just amazed.

“They were the most gorgeous little kids you’ve ever seen and they could drill a ball through a door.

“Kids are always trying to do things like that, but they were four or five years old at the time.

“We instantly as a club fell in love with them and there was always this thing that these boys are going to play League footy.”

But would it be for Essendon, which only seemed fair and right?

Davey snr walked into the team in his first year at Essendon in 2007, Kevin Sheedy’s last as coach, and played the first 14 games before a broken arm ended his season.

He lasted just five games the following year before a season-ending knee injury.

He played 20 games in 2009, but form issues and niggles started to emerge and, by 2013, when he turned 29, he accepted a one-year deal.

AFL club list managers don’t often hold any sway when it comes to team selection –except when a player might be approaching 100 games.

It is a significant milestone in football as the threshold for the father-son rule.

(A father needs only to have played one AFL game for his daughter to qualify for an AFLW list spot.)

Essendon people clearly remember 2006, when Sheedy ensured Dean Rioli played four games to get to 100, despite being past his best.

It meant if Rioli was to have any sons, they could play for the Bombers without having to go into the open draft.

Essendon established the James Hird Academy in 2010 to find and nurture players from non-football backgrounds as well as potential father-sons or daughters.

“This club takes the father-son rule really seriously,” Dodoro said.

“It’s something that’s been built through history and the generations that have passed through the club have always been taught to respect the past.

Davey started that season on 81 games, but after a three-week hamstring injury and a dip in form in July, the Bombers had some thinking to do.

“I was struggling to perform as well as I would have liked and I had injuries and general soreness as well … I just couldn’t find any form,” Davey said.

In any other year and at any other club, a line would likely have been put through him at selection.

Essendon had a handy team that season, winning 14 games to qualify for the finals before the AFL’s sanctions for the supplements saga ruled it out of September.

As 2013 drew to a close, the past, present and future converged at Essendon.

“I certainly was influencing the boys (the coaching staff) to give Alwyn games,” Dodoro said.

“When you’ve got a father whose children looked like they could be good footballers, we wanted to invest in that – and we got him to 100.”

Davey snr’s last game for Essendon came in the final round of 2013.

It was a dispiriting game, a 39-point loss to Richmond after James Hird was made to stand down as coach as part of the supplements scandal sanctions, leaving future Melbourne premiership coach Simon Goodwin, then a Bombers assistant, to take charge.

“I was just hanging in there (and) to the club’s credit, they kept picking me,” Davey said.

“Simon Goodwin was the coach for that last game and I think he was the one who decided that, yeah, I had to play because it was important to the club that I get to 100 games.”

Davey retired at the end of the season – his body was no longer co-operating, but he understood the big picture as well.

His work was done.

“I think he was probably amused at how desperate we were to get him out there,” Dodoro said.

“We had to get those boys qualified.”

Several years later, it was time to put the work into the Davey family once again.

Dodoro had recruited dad to the club and the effort made to get him to 100 games had to be rewarded by bringing Alwyn jnr and Jayden on board.

Alwyn snr’s path to the Bombers was from NTFL club Palmerston via South Adelaide, but the boys left Darwin to board at Xavier College, playing for Ashburton and Oakleigh Chargers.

Alwyn jnr was the 45th selection at last year’s NAB AFL Draft, with Jayden taken nine picks later.

The brothers have heard the stories about the Bombers pulling out all stops to ensure first call on their services and are just old enough to remember when they had the run of the football club.

“Dad would pick us up from school, which was just near Windy Hill,” Alwyn jnr said.

“I remember me and Jayden would always just run into the changerooms and go to (legendary former club doctor Bruce ) ‘Doc’ Reid and get lollies or jellybeans off him, and then grabbing a footy and trying to steer it in between the goals.”

Jayden is sitting out 2023 after a knee reconstruction late last year, but plays like his father – a speedy, crumbing forward with terrific goal sense.

Alwyn jnr debuted against Hawthorn in round one, delighting the Bomber faithful with a goal, and will develop into a wing/high-half-forward as he gains size and experience.

He has played seven games, including the Anzac Day blockbuster, but Saturday night’s Dreamtime at the ‘G takes that to another level.

“It’s so important, not just for indigenous communities but also other communities who are learning off our indigenous heritage,” Alwyn jnr said.

“It’s a great way to get that learning experience for them, but also for indigenous players around remembrance and what we’ve gone through.

“And showing off our talent to the crowd is something very special.”

As always, it will be a showpiece night for the game, and hopefully for Essendon, a night where some deft thinking a decade ago continues to pay off.

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