Max Gawn backs Steven May, Clayton Oliver to have big 2026, questions ruck rule change
Max Gawn has backed both Steven May and Clayton Oliver to make a splash in 2026, calling himself the ‘No.1 fan’ of the new Giant. Plus, he weighs in on the AFL’s call to scrap the bounce.
Melbourne captain Max Gawn says “fabulous teammate” Steven May is already fighting to keep his spot in the Dees side as he declared the AFL were “reacting” to rucks that had already been found out with incoming rule changes.
An “excited” Gawn will lead the Demons into a new era next season with a new coach in Steven King, new CEO in Paul Guerra and an incoming new president in Steven Smith.
While Gawn said he was initially hesitant about Melbourne’s move to trade out “icons” Christian Petracca and Clayton Oliver, he fully backed the club revamp.
Oliver lived with Gawn in recent years as he worked through personal issues and the skipper said he was “still in strong dialogue” with his former midfield mate now he has moved to GWS.
“I am his No.1 supporter, I want everything to go extremely well from here and for him to get back to the Clayton Oliver of old and have an outstanding back-end of the career,” Gawn told SEN.
“I didn’t think that (a fresh start was good for Oliver) initially, once he got traded I thought, ‘This is not a bad thing for him’.”
Gawn said Petracca, who has moved to Gold Coast, had maintained strong form this year despite detractors.
The Dees leader said that the club was ready to shake up a list that had slumped to 14th in both of the last two seasons.
“I don’t think we missed the boat by waiting a year, I like the fact that they backed us in to have another crack and now two years is enough data (for change),” he said.
The Dees would have moved May on if the defender found a suitor after an honest exit meeting made clear he was no guarantee of playing in the seniors in 2026.
May and Gawn infamously had an on-field dust up after a narrow King’s Birthday loss to Collingwood this year but on Monday Gawn fell in behind the backman.
“He is training his backside off to make sure that young guy they brought up doesn’t get his spot, which is exactly what we want Steven May to do,” he said.
“He is a fabulous teammate, fabulous person and biasedly I am quite happy he is still there because I know the kind of player he can be.”
Gawn will spend his 17th AFL pre-season preparing for a new-look in the ruck with the centre bounce now extinct and new league rules in place which stop rucks wrestling.
One of the best rucks of all time, Gawn said he felt wrestlers had been worked out in the back end of the season and losing the bounce “disappoints me a tiny bit” as it made restarts “very predictable”.
“Those guys who were wrestling really hard like Brodie (Grundy), Tristan (Xerri) and Rowan Marshall actually weren’t that effective in centre bounce, at the back-end of the year we were starting to come up with a formula to beat that,” he said.
“I’m not sure, I think they are reacting to what was happening at the start of the year.”
Originally published as Max Gawn backs Steven May, Clayton Oliver to have big 2026, questions ruck rule change
