By Peter Ryan
Father-son recruit Nick Daicos will make his senior Collingwood debut against St Kilda on Friday night at Marvel Stadium, with Magpies coach Craig McRae excited about the career start of a “really professional and engaging young man”.
Daicos will play his first game against the same opponent as his famous dad, Peter, who played his first game for Collingwood at Victoria Park in round four, 1979, a game the Magpies won by 178 points.
Nick Daicos (second from right) at Collingwood training on Wednesday, ahead of his senior debut on Friday night.Credit: Getty Images
Nick will also join his brother Josh, who has already played 52 games for the Magpies and won a goal-of-the-year award.
However, assistant coaches Brendon Bolton and Josh Fraser will not be at the match as they are isolating under the AFL’s COVID-19 health and safety protocols, while Magpies wingman Will Hoskin-Elliott will miss under the same protocols.
Nick Daicos was taken with pick four in the 2021 national draft after Collingwood matched Gold Coast’s bid for the young star. He was the Magpies’ best player in their recent community series game against the Giants.
The whole club stood in a circle at the AIA Centre during training as McRae announced that Daicos would make his debut, with former Western Bulldog midfielder Patrick Lipinski also to play his first game for the club after crossing during the trade period.
McRae described the moment as exciting, and foreshadowed the pair won’t be the only ones to make their debuts for Collingwood in 2022 as they look to build a new group at a new-look Collingwood.
“Out there [making the announcement] I didn’t talk about Nick, the footballer. I talked about Nick the person and Nick the person is just high character, high work rate, really professional and engaging young man,” McRae said.
“[Lipinski] is an outstanding young man as well who was just starved of opportunity, and he gets an opportunity with us and hasn’t put a foot wrong.”
Mason Cox will also play, with McRae saying all he needed to do was provide a contest, while vice-captains Jeremy Howe and Taylor Adams are fit and available.
McRae conceded their backline was missing key personnel for the season’s start, with Brayden Maynard suspended, and Jordan Roughead and Charlie Dean injured in the pre-season, but he said their absence created opportunities for others.
McRae said he preferred to look forward rather than back, and so he found a silver lining in Maynard’s suspension.
“We want to get Brayden through the midfield more than we had planned in the pre-season, and we did our numbers and he had not had much exposure to that,” McRae said.
Maynard will play in the midfield in a VFL practice match this week and build his tank so that he could be used in that role as the year progresses.
McRae said Jordan De Goey may not have been exposed to as much contact training as others because of the club-imposed suspension over summer while facing assault charges in New York, but he was fit and would play on Friday night.
McRae said he was ready to go in his first game as coach, and he was savouring every minute.
“I am just going to embrace it,” McRae said.
Meanwhile, Geelong will not risk Mitch Duncan for their clash against Essendon. The Cats will also be without small defender Jed Bews due to concussion while Mark O’Connor, Sam Menegola and Gryan Miers remain unavailable.
However, Jack Henry and Tom Stewart are available. Cats coach Chris Scott confirmed Sam De Koning would play as a key defender in his second game, while Max Holmes and Tyson Stengle are also certain starters after impressive pre-seasons.
Keep up to date with the best AFL coverage in the country. Sign up for the Real Footy newsletter.