Michael Firrito returns to home club Gembrook-Cockatoo
MICHAEL Firrito is coming home.
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MICHAEL Firrito is coming home.
After 275 games with North Melbourne over a 14-year span, followed by a year in the Essendon District Football League with Strathmore, Firrito has signed on with junior club Gembrook-Cockatoo for 2018.
Brookers coach Matt O’Neill said Firrito probably didn’t realise how big an impact his return would have on the club and the community.
“For him, it’s more about coming home and finishing off his career where it all started,” O’Neill said.
“But for the club, it’s probably the biggest thing in the club’s history.
“The club is about 115 years old now, so to get someone of that calibre back … We’ve had (other AFL players return), but no one who has gone on to league level with that number of games. It’s just fantastic.”
Firrito, who turned 34 on Monday, played only two senior games at the Brookers before pursuing higher honours with the Eastern Ranges and then Box Hill Hawks, eventually rookie-listed for the Kangaroos in the 2003 season.
He went on to play 275 games for North Melbourne, finishing as equal ninth on the club’s all-time senior games played list.
He arrives as Gembrook-Cockatoo seeks a return to the top flight of the AFL Yarra Ranges competition after going winless through Division 1 in 2017.
It marked a rapid descent after winning the Division 2 premiership the preceding year.
“It wasn’t ideal with our list,” O’Neill said.
“We were at the wrong end of the age bracket. We had 11 or 12 leave or retire from the premiership in 2016, so last year we just focused on getting the under 18 boys back up and running after not having them for seven or eight years.
“The under 16s won the flag, so we have a good crop of young kids coming through over the next three or four years that we really think we can build off and get sustained success once get back to Division 1.”
While not taking an official role, Firrito will play a key part in the team’s development. But he is not the only experienced face to be gracing Gembrook Sports Ground.
His good friend and full-forward Marcus Kenny will come to the side.
Kenny, who kicked 106 goals for Airport West in Division 1 in 2012, followed by 128 over the next two seasons in Premier Division. But he has not played since injuring a knee while playing with Macedon in 2015.
Both are hoped to feature in 10-12 games as well as finals.
O’Neill believes others will want to come to the club based on Firrito’s return, but he was mindful of wanting to do the right thing by the club.
“We don’t want players for one year, we want two or three years to get that success and make it viable in Division 1,” he said.
“We don’t want to go up and lose five or six players.”
The club will lose Eamon Tomlin and Simon Ponter (returning to Western Australia), while Ben Fenton (knee) will miss, but O’Neill hopes injured players Nathan (knee) and Dan Leversha (broken collarbone) and Leigh Scott are among those to return.
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