Local stars to lead

With the AFL season beginning in less than two months, two Moorabool footballers are set to fill leadership roles at their respective clubs.

The Bacchus Marsh and Darley Football Netball Clubs have eagerly followed the careers of their former players, Liam Duggan (West Coast) and Zak Butters (Port Adelaide) respectively – and the two have landed much-deserved leadership roles for the 2024 season.

Duggan, who is a 2018 premiership medallist and received the Chris Mainwaring Medal (Best Clubman) at West Coast in 2021, has been named Eagles co-captain alongside Oscar Allen.

Butters, who was named John Cahill Medallist (Best & Fairest) at Port Adelaide and also earned a maiden All-Australian selection, as well as the AFLCA Champion Player of the Year award, will be vice captain under new captain and fellow 2018 draftee, Connor Rozee.

Duggan and Allen are just the second set of co-captains named in the Eagles’ 37-year history, while the decision to name Rozee and Butters as captain and vice captain at just 23 years of age shows the faith that Port Adelaide coach Ken Hinkley has in the two young guns.

While the West Coast and Port Adelaide media teams were unable to respond to the Moorabool News’ enquiries, both Duggan and Butters have expressed their excitement about their roles to AFL.com.au’s reporters.

“Although the club has had one captain during my time and Oscar’s time, it hasn’t just been run by one player in that leadership group,” Mr Duggan said.

“Although there’s two people with the label now, we’ll still be working with the team as Luke did and Shannon did. It’s going to be a team effort. Everyone is really excited about where we’re heading, and this is just another part of that process.”

“We’re in that middle part of the group now where there’s older guys and also some younger guys coming through, so if we can keep pushing the older guys like Miles Bergman, Mitch Georgiades, Dyl Williams to start to speak up a bit more and give them the confidence to talk more when they see us doing it rather than maybe Charlie (Dixon) or ‘Boaky’ (Travis Boak) or the older guys. If we can bridge that middle ground, it would help them get involved more,” Mr Butters added.

“There were definitely some tough times early on living away from home and finding my feet a bit as well, and if you told me then I’d get to eight years I probably would have said you were kidding yourself. But now I’m five or six years in that’s happening and I wouldn’t see myself anywhere else.”

Duggan says he is excited to work with the Eagles young up-and-coming list, with 22 players under the age of 21, while Butters re-signed with the Power until 2026 last year and will no doubt be keen to see Port improve on their 2023 season, which saw them exit the finals in straight sets.