The six clubs under most pressure to nail their picks in 2025 AFL Draft
Every club wants to go well on draft night, but there is extra pressure on some to absolutely nail their selections. Jon Ralph names and analyses the six teams who just have to get it right.
A pair of high-profile delistings 48 hours apart late in October were another reminder for Essendon’s list team of the absolute necessity of nailing Wednesday’s draft.
Only four years after drafting Ben Hobbs with the No. 13 overall draft pick Essendon was casting him to the wind.
On draft night in 2021 then-list boss Adrian Dodoro said the club had him in their top seven selections and yet this off-season the tough inside mid was gone despite 50 games quite often played out of position.
Two days later Will Phillips was delisted by North Melbourne despite his status as the No. 3 overall pick in the much-maligned 2020 national draft.
He was spruiked on draft night by the Roos as “a relentless competitor who has leadership and a first-class character” and yet he is far from the only casualty of that Covid-affected draft.
It has been a dramatic month for the top 12 picks in that 2020 national draft – Jamarra Ugle-Hagan traded, Elijah Hollands delisted, Nik Cox allowed back into full training after concussion based issues and Tanner Bruhn finally able to restart his AFL career.
But as has been so well advertised, there is so much uncertainty about Essendon’s trio of top 10 draft picks from 2020 in Archie Perkins, Cox and Zac Reid, with pick 39 Josh Eyre and pick 53 Cody Brand already gone.
On Wednesday night clubs will draft into a pool of talent some believe resembles that 2020 national draft in terms of paucity of talent.
Essendon will join West Coast, Richmond and Melbourne in taking multiple selections in that draft that will form key planks of their rebuilds.
The Dons will almost certainly secure a third top 10 pick on draft night courtesy of a trade for Carlton’s pick nine.
With Hobbs gone and the jury out on fellow top 10 pick Elijah Tsatas, no club has ever needed to nail a draft like Essendon.
Put simply, this club is desperately thin on A-graders and will need every bit of recruiting nous and intel it has accumulated this season to sort the wheat from the chaff.
Even in a thin draft the best recruiters can prosper.
As Essendon went Cox, Perkins, Reid (who still looks a future star), Geelong secured Max Holmes at pick 20 and Shannon Neale at pick 33.
So which clubs have the most riding on the 2025 national draft?
WEST COAST
Nail this draft and the Eagles can finally look ahead to one day playing finals again.
The Eagles are well aware they have an extraordinary talent deficit when it comes to top 10 picks on their playing list, with only the newly re-signed No. 1 overall pick Harley Reid and strong-bodied defender Reuben Ginbey.
This year Gold Coast had 10 top 10 selections on its list and will add two more (Zeke Uwland and Dylan Patterson) in the top five in coming days.
West Coast’s expected pair of early selections in Willem Duursma and Cooper Duff-Tytler follow Reid as elite top three picks for a club that has been forced to split its very early picks in the recent past.
The club used pick 14 on Campbell Chesser in 2021 (he was just traded to Carlton) then split pick 2 on Ginbey and pick 14 Elijah Hewett in 2022.
It also split its pick 3 last year to secure Liam Baker (via trade) and Bo Allan, who played six games off half back as a 191cm defender and future mid.
So now it finally gets to pick the best players in the draft, aware it has got rid of enough list cloggers that it can draft for pure talent instead of trying to bolster its number of competitive players.
Duursma and Duff-Tytler represent hope, X-factor and players who play in game-changing positions as a unicorn who can roam anywhere (Duursma) and an exciting forward-ruck in an area of need for the Eagles (Duff-Tytler).
Then at pick 13 the Eagles can go homegrown and/or can continue to bolster their midfield, aware they also have exciting NGA goalsneak Tylah Williams as a player likely to be bid on somewhere in the mid-30s.
With four extra rookie spots via AFL assistance, they have room for other NGA prospects in Wes Walley, Koby Evans and Charlie Banfield either late in the draft or as rookies.
ESSENDON
There was always a method in Essendon’s madness of ignoring Hawthorn’s best offer for Zach Merrett of 10, 22 a future first-rounder and Henry Husthwaite.
The Dons have long earmarked securing another top 12 pick given their assortment of mid-20s picks (21, 27, 30) with the aspiration of securing a trio of elite players before considering their academy small forwards Adam Sweid and Hussain El Achkar.
They knew they could keep Merrett, still secure a third top 12 selection after picks four and five and have the best of both worlds – an elite 2025 draft hand and retention of their (soon to be former) captain.
Now that third early selection is likely to be Carlton’s No. 9 draft pick, with the Blues likely to trade it in case of an early bid on father-son Harry Dean just as the Dons did with their 2024 selection in case of top 10 bids on Isaak Kako.
Now the challenge is actually finding potential A-graders and difference-makers to add to the recent exciting draft haul in Nate Caddy, Archie Roberts, Kako and wingman Angus Clarke.
By the time Essendon drafts, the expectation is Duursma and Duff-Tytler will be off the board (and Uwland, Patterson, Harry Dean and Dan Annable are father-son or academy linked).
Richmond (picks 3 and 4) has two picks before Essendon (picks 5 and 6) and has been linked to elite-kicking defender Xavier Taylor and draft bolter Sullivan Robey (a big-bodied mid-forward).
So any of Central Districts mid Dyson Sharp, North Adelaide mid Sam Cumming, Oakleigh Chargers speedster Sam Grlj and Central Districts ruck forward Aidan Schubert are in their mix.
If Essendon does draft mids early, how prepared are they to give them centre square opportunities with Parish returning from injury, with Merrett presumably wanting to play centre square and with Tsatas desperately needing his chance?
Regardless, there have rarely been more important drafts for a club’s future.
RICHMOND
Richmond’s full-blown rebuild is shaping up beautifully but it isn’t over yet.
The reality of any rebuild from rock-bottom to flag is that it takes much longer than anyone thinks.
The previous flag core of Trent Cotchin, Jack Riewoldt and Alex Rance were all well into their 20s before this list was mature enough to compete regularly.
So as enticing as a Sam Lalor-Taj Hotton-Josh Smillie centre square midfield is in future years, those players might be 25 before this club is in true flag contention.
And by that stage Nick Vlastuin, Nathan Broad, Tim Taranto and Jacob Hopper will likely be retired.
So with picks three and four Richmond has the chance to build elite midfield and defensive depth even after drafting those young mids as well as defenders Luke Trainor, Josh Gibcus and Tom Brown in recent years.
Smillie is a big-bodied mid at 195cm but 192cm mid-forward Sullivan Robey would add a point of difference given he is just as comfortable up forward, while Sam Grlj has the breakaway pace Richmond needs.
The 192cm intercept defender Xavier Taylor might just be too talented to ignore given his exceptional year as a rebuilding intercept defender.
And if he will start his career well back in a backline backed with talented mid-sized talls, the sheer patience needed for a full-blown midfield means by the time Vlastuin and Broad retire he will be ready to flourish.
MELBOURNE
No pressure, Melbourne.
Steven King only needs to replace one of footy’s greatest extractors and one of the most dangerous mid-forwards of this current generation.
The positive for Demons fans in building a list that does not include Clayton Oliver and Christian Petracca is that some of the heavy lifting has already been done.
And the last time recruiter Jason Taylor had two early picks – only 12 months ago – he found the silky Xavier Lindsay at pick 12 as well as Rising Star contender Harvey Langford.
Melbourne will have to wait on the opening night of the draft while picks seven and eight push back with father-son and academy picks, then wait again while players high on their draft board are picked off by the Tigers, Eagles and Dons.
But since the 2019 national draft the Demons have secured players inside the top 21 draft picks including Jake Bowey (pick 21), Jacob Van Rooyen (pick 19), Matthew Jefferson (pick 15), Koltyn Tholstrup (pick 14), Kozzie Pickett (pick 13), Lindsay (pick 12), Caleb Windsor (pick 7) and Langford (pick 6).
So instead of starting at ground zero recruiter Jason Taylor can pick the eyes out of a draft that by that stage is extremely open.
It could be another small forward in Lachy Dovaston or a half back distributor in Josh Lindsay or one of the leftover mids that the Tigers and Dons ignore.
But for a club adding to its elite young core instead of having to start over, in Taylor we trust.
NORTH MELBOURNE
The Roos have a chance to claw back some of the ground lost when they traded away their future first-rounder for the chance to secure Matt Whitlock with pick 27 in last year’s draft.
The Roos are on track to secure Carlton’s No. 11 draft pick in exchange for their future second-rounder and their own No. 25 pick, allowing them to retain their own No. 26 pick in this draft.
That No. 25 pick came to the Roos from Richmond as the second part of the Whitlock deal.
A season on, the Roos will continue to back in the philosophy behind that Whitlock contentious trade even if their fans say the mistake was giving up pick 25 in a trade for Caleb Daniel, not giving up a future pick for a key back.
The Roos made that decision because they wanted to get 12 months of development into another key back, aware this draft had few of them.
That crystal-balling has proved correct – Harry Dean is the best defender and he is Carlton-linked, Xavier Taylor is only 192cm and lock-down defender Blake Thredgold will still be available mid-way through the draft.
So if Whitlock can keep developing and they can hit pay dirt at pick 11 and 26 in this draft, they will believe they can continue their list build without setback.
Even Richmond is aware the 11th or even 20th player off the board might be as good as the sixth one, so this is the draft for the Roos to level the score after last year’s trade.
COLLINGWOOD
There is bravery and then there is overlooking the son of a Collingwood 1990 premiership legend in the national draft.
But Collingwood knows the risks of deciding not to take father-son pick Tom McGuane in the national draft, having seen him up close for years as part of their academy program and most recently in a handful of VFL games.
So they will move on having done enough work to know that if that decision bites them in the bum, it won’t be through not doing enough due diligence.
Collingwood has an array of back-end picks – 39, 45, 56, 58, 67 – but hasn’t given up hope of being a player in this draft because of two factors.
The club’s academy ruck-forward Zac McCarthy could still be taken with a late pick in the first round.
And Collingwood is aware that having given up its 2026 first-rounder in the Dan Houston trade, those back-end picks are still crucial.
Last year it secured Charlie West at pick 50 and Will Hayes at pick 56, with both making their debuts despite the calibre of this team.
So list boss Justin Leppitsch and new recruiter Shane O’Bree will believe Collingwood can be big players in this draft in a year where the Pies need to bring in new talent given the departure of flag heroes Mason Cox, Will Hoskin-Elliott, Tom Mitchell and Brody Mihocek.
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Originally published as The six clubs under most pressure to nail their picks in 2025 AFL Draft
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