SANDRINGHAM Dragons are chasing a record-equaling fourth straight Coates Talent League premiership in 2025, boasting an even and deep squad of players. Among them are five members of the Vic Metro hub and plenty of club-tied prospects. We highlight them with help from coach Rob Harding.

PRESEASON

“I’ve been really pleased with the Dragons’ preseason. We have a really big preseason training squad. We had a hundred on the track at our peak, which is an enormous amount, and finalised our squad now at 68. Really excited by this group, it’s quite an even group for us. I think there’s a number of guys that are going to pop up through the year and potentially push for Vic Metro selection.”

TOP-AGE VIC METRO HUB MEMBERS

Xavier Bamert
Midfielder | 185cm | 29/01/2007

“Xavier’s a strongly built, powerful inside midfielder. He runs a 5:50 2km [time trial], so he’s elite at covering the ground and his real strength is powering out of stoppage and contest. Last year we played him a little bit through half-back and outside the centre square, just to develop him in different spots. He played in our premiership team, hurt his shoulder in that game against the Rebels but he’s had a great preseason. He has done virtually every session.”

Jack Dalton
Midfielder | 177cm | 05/04/2007

“Dalts is also a premiership player from last year and had a great 16s year as Metro captain and MVP. He’s just continued to develop his game over the last couple of years. Like Xavier he’s a power runner, so he covers the ground well and he’ll play a mix of wing, mid, and half-forward. He’s a real hard worker and one of the leaders in our program.”

Kye Fincher
Defender/Midfielder | 184cm | 18/11/2007

“Kai’s part of St Kilda’s NGA. He’s an exciting prospect for us. We’ve trained him as a midfielder through this preseason. He can play half-back as well, so we’ll work through where we settle him down over the next couple of weeks, but probably more likely to be half-back and reads the play really well. Beautiful ball user and he’s a good one that the Saints have got sitting there.”

Archie Ludowyke
Key Forward | 197cm | 19/11/2007

“Ludo is super exciting. Big key forward, still pretty lightly built so very athletic, jumps, takes the ball at the highest point and he’s a nice set shot for goal. He just missed our grand final team last year, he got injured the week before but played in the [AFL] grand final day game on the MCG. I think Archie has the capability to play behind the ball as well, we might explore that at some point. He’s with Vic Metro, AFL Academy, Dragons and school footy at Brighton Grammar, so has a pretty big year ahead of him.”

Miles Tyrer
Ruck | 200cm | 18/08/2007

“Miles is a big ruckman, he’s really strongly built. He came in at 199.7cm so is bit unlucky to be a shade under 200cm, but has beautiful tap craft and is a strong contested player. We spent some time with him playing as a key forward last year as part of his development and in the game against Geelong late in the year he kicked a couple of goals and showed some good leading as well. So, excited to develop him as a key forward and ruck, but he’s primarily our number one ruck.”

ONES TO WATCH

“We think Sacha Levine is going really well, and Rory Wright. Both those guys are inside midfielders with a bit of size to them and their ability to power out a contest is really exciting. We’ve got a 19-year-old named Julian Galbally, who’s a big ruckman over 200cm. His birth date is around Christmas time, so he just qualifies to be an over-ager. He only came into our program last year. Big athletic ruckman, covers the ground really well and he’s had a fantastic preseason. He’s in Year 12 this year but eligible to be picked up in the mid-season draft. We think Ricky Theodoropoulas is going to be one of the better small forwards in the comp this year. He’s low to the ground, he’s hard to tackle and really good around goals.”

BOTTOM-AGERS

“We’re really excited about our bottom-age crop at the Dragons. We think our 2026 crew is going to be very good. Arki Butler and Jack Surkitt were the two we were able to expose at 18s level last year. Arki as a deep forward, but I think he’ll grow into being a midfielder, and Jack as a high half-forward. We’ve got some really good talls that we like.

“Alex Dreaver, a big ruckman, Tyson Bradley, Hank Thomas, Ben Challis. These guys are key backs or key forwards. Albert Macgowan and Gus Teixeira as midfielders we really like. Jack Davies, a young man who’s come across from South Australia, moved to Victoria. He’s a tall rangy midfielder that we think’s got good prospects as well. We’ll look to expose quite a few of those bottom-agers through this year when we get the opportunity.”

OVER-AGERS

“We’ve brought back Sam Buck who played in the premiership team, had a shoulder injury through last year. He’s done all the preseason with us but spent a little bit of time with the Sandy Zebras as well in his VFL alignment. Charlie Rozenes, who had a couple of hamstring injuries last year, kicked five goals in a half in a Vic Metro trial and was pretty unlucky not to make the final squad last year. He’s just been rehabbing through that hamstring injury and is back playing now.

:The other one we’re excited about is Jhett Haeata, who broke his arm late last year. When he broke his arm he was actually leading our best and fairest off only eight games. He’s done the whole preseason at Richmond VFL and come back to us a few times along the way. His combination of speed and agility and his beautiful ball use by foot, we think he’s an AFL player. We hope these guys get looked at for mid-season draft, if not they’ll be with us through this year and hopefully get looked at again at the end of the year.”

CLUB & FAMILY TIES

“We do have a number of St Kilda Academy players that are in our program as top-agers this year. Kye Fincher we spoke about before. Rio Barry, an Indigenous small forward who’s at Scotch College. James Mikhael, who’s a strongly built powerful inside midfielder. Keanu Nadji who’s a third tall defender. Those guys are all top-agers, and we’ve got a few bottom-agers coming through as well who are NGA for St Kilda, but also brothers of AFL-listed players. Quentin Hofmann, whose brother Lenny was drafted by Geelong last year, and Rowan Mackenzie, whose brother is Cam at Hawthorn.

STYLE OF PLAY

“We really put a premium on contest first. That’s the way I coach and that’s what I believe in. That’s how I’ve been educated over the journey. We provide in this program a window into what an AFL program looks like in the time that we have with our players. We hope our training reflects that and what we value in contest and fundamentals. I really have a premium on guys being clean over the ball and approaching their contest work well, whether it’s in offense or defence. So, that’s always a starting point for me, I love competitors and I know AFL clubs want that as well.”

GOALS

“Our job is to give guys the most opportunity to get drafted. We’re really proud of the Dragons that the last three years we’ve had 10-plus players drafted each year. This group is a very even group and we hope to get close to that number again. But for us we just want to keep providing opportunities for these high level players and provide them with a high level program. We don’t really focus on team results until the back-end of the year, so it’s more about opportunity at the start and it’s going to take us quite a while to work out what the best team looks like for us this year because it’s such an even crop.”

ROUND 1

“We’re excited to play Western in Round 1. We didn’t play them in the home-and-away at all last year but we played them in Wildcard Round at the start of finals and they’ve got some really exciting players in their group. I spent a little bit of time on the first Metro camp this year with Tom McGuane and coached Tom Burton last year as well.”