The connection that led Brendan Fevola to a guest appearance at Heidelberg West

Brendan Fevola is returning to the local footy field for a one-off guest appearance with Heidelberg West. Here’s how the Hawks signed him up.

Brendan Fevola participates in the half-time Kick for the Kids.

Heidelberg West will have a two-time Coleman Medallist at its disposal on Saturday.

Brendan Fevola, 623 goals in 204 games for Carlton and Brisbane, will don the brown and gold at Heidelberg Park against Fitzroy Stars.

It guest appearance will be his second in the Northern Football Netball League after playing for Hurstbridge in 2016.

The Hawks secured Fevola’s services through major sponsor, General Chicken Co owner, Nuri Sadiku.

The pair played Vic Metro Masters together at Diamond Valley Over-35s.

Brendan Fevola in action for Port Melbourne Colts in 2023. Picture: Alex Coppel

Heidelberg West president Craig Toohey said the club had been looking to bring in a marquee player and Fevola was the ideal candidate.

“We’ve never really done the marquee player before and we’ve lost a couple of players overseas so we had the points,” Toohey said.

“We thought why not, we looked into it and threw up a few names and that didn’t work out.

“We’ve got a connection, Fev plays SuperRules with our sponsor Nuri at General Chicken Co, he asked if he was interested and before you know it he agreed.

“We’ve got our past players day as well, we’ve had a lot of messages, so hopefully everything clicks into place and it will be a good day.”

Heidelberg West has had two weeks off after a competition bye followed by the King’s Birthday weekend league bye.

The Hawks claimed their biggest win of the season in their last game before the break, knocking off premiership contender Old Eltham Collegians by three points.

They face another huge challenge with the second-placed Stars visiting Heidelberg Park.

At the half-way mark of the campaign, West sits in eighth with a 3-5 record, two games outside the top-five.

Fevola will take up his customary role in attack and Toohey hopes it will be a look into the future.

“He’s be tucked in a goalsquare I’m sure,” Toohey said.

“We don’t have a big main target, we’ve got a lot of hybrid forwards, so it’s not like he’s pushing anyone out or ruining the gameplan.

“We’ve actually been looking for that focal target all year, it’s in our recruiting targets for next year, so he’ll slot in nicely and hopefully our midfielders can get it in quickly.

“Fitzroy Stars are flying this year, they’ve got some quality players as well.

“We’re excited, we’ll have a good team in, we’re relatively injury free and have a few players coming back in.

“We’ve been a bit unlucky, we’ve got teams at their peak and one week where gastro went through the club and we lost about 15 players against Mernda.

“A new coach and new gameplan it was always going to be up-and-down but against Old Eltham we put it together and showed if we play like that we can compete with anyone.”

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West will also unveil its brand new scoreboard, which is sure to please supporters.

“Our brand new electric scoreboard has been put in and this will be the first time we’d used that,” Toohey said.

“Bendigo Bank came to the party, along with Banyule Council, so we’re very thankful and I know it’s always been a bugbear for the fans that no one could see the scores.”

The match kicks off at 2.10pm.