ORFFA Round 1 - teams and chat

Cradle Mountain Devils provisional Round 1 team

Def: R Laird, D Zorko, S Banks, J Battle (R Ginbey)
Mid: J Steele, S Pendlebury, J Hopper, J De Goey (E Langdon)
Ruc: T Nankervis
Fwd: S Mannagh, T Greene, A Naughton, L Schultz (P Wright)
Inter: T English, R Maric (D Wilson)

 

Lilacs have no one playing tonight

 

cows looking to let midfielders James Trezise and Zak Johnson soak up the atmosphere at the Bulls Hit Tavern after observing from the bench. Mind you they both have had pretty good pre-seasons. Mmmm, could be a late change ...

Best of luck @Len , hope the Jags players appreciate being billeted at local farms. There is a shortage of accommodation due to the regional sheep shearing semi-finals in Waikick.

 

Ugly, ugly week for the Lilacs, get through this week then we can regroup over the next two weeks that we don't play.

 

Both Trezise (66) and Johnson ended up on the Interchange bench. So Johnson and Ward play tonight. The cows rnd 1 team is:
D - Fletcher, O'Sullivan, Rivers, Coleman
M - Dunkley, Williams (dogs), Ward, Erasmus (Johnson freo)
R - Edwards (cats)
F - Treacy, Reid (freo), Papley, Owens (Neale)
I- Trezise, Johnson (ess) (Graham)

A lot of kids going round, the average age of the squad is 23.6 years.

 

Cradle Mountain Devils Round 1 2026 team, unchanged from the post earlier in the week.

In: L Schultz, J De Goey
Out: N Vlastuin (ankle), W Milera (delisted)

New: Lachlan Schultz (club debut), Jordan De Goey (club debut)

Def: R Laird, D Zorko, S Banks 88, J Battle (R Ginbey)
Mid: J Steele, S Pendlebury, J Hopper 50, J De Goey (E Langdon)
Ruc: T Nankervis 103
Fwd: S Mannagh, T Greene, A Naughton, L Schultz (P Wright)
Inter: T English, R Maric (D Wilson)

241/3 Average 83.3 Players in bold took the field in the AFL on Thursday night.

For their opening game of 2026 Cradle Mountain have made two changes to the team that lost a thrilling 2025 ORFFA Grand Final to Charlies Opening by 26 points. Two players that started in the backline on Grand Final day last year, defenders Nick Vlastuin and Wayne Milera are out of the team. Vlastuin needs to build his match conditioning after suffering an ankle injury in the Grand Final and in a difficult decision Milera was delisted in the pre-season with each club required to have a maximum of 22 players on their list at the start of the PSD. Milera was selected by Shark Bay Tigersharks with pick 53 at the 2026 PSD and will be playing against Cradle Mountain this weekend.Two automatic selections in Cradle Mountain's best 15 with Vlastuin joined in this category by ruckman Rowan Marshall who suffered a concussion in the club's last pre-season game.

Cradle Mountain welcome Head Coach @PhilArthur and his Shark Bay Tigersharks to the ORFFA. The Devils are looking forward to playing an away game this weekend and being the first team to play against the Shark Bay Tigersharks in the ORFFA. The Tigersharks were formerly the Dunsborough Dung Beetles with Cursing Fijian as their Head Coach. After Cursing Fijian announced that he would not be continuing as an ORFFA club in 2026 Phil Arthur was quickly appointed as a Head Coach. Milera has been selected as defender 2 for Shark Bay’s inaugural game in the ORFFA which is a better outcome for him than being a fringe player at CMD contesting against Sam Banks, Josh Battle and Ryan Maric for the D4 position in the Devils best 15. The Devils thank Milera for his short stint at the Devils after the 2025 MSD, wish him all the best for the future and look forward to catching with him after this weekend’s game.

The Devils duo making their club debut in Round 1 2026 were both selected in the third round of the 2026 PSD after being delisted by their previous club in the pre-season. Forward Lachlan Schultz (formerly at Wagga Wagga Wombats) was selected with pick 42 at the PSD and three picks later the Devils choose forward/midfielder Jordan De Goey (Iron Knob Codpieces) at 45. With this duo CMD benefitted from clubs having to cut their lists to 22 players before the PSD. Entering the 2026 PSD the Devils were stronger in the ruck and defensive lines than the midfield and forward lines so were delighted to strengthen the front half of the ground by recruiting Schultz and De Goey. On club debut Schultz and De Goey will play in Cradle Mountain’s F4 and M4 positions respectively.

After being an official Cradle Mountain captain for four seasons from 2022 to 2025 Jack Steele stood down as captain after the 2025 season. Steele was appointed co-captain with fellow midfielder Scott Pendlebury for the 2022 season and became CMD’s sole captain in 2023 with Toby Nankervis as vice-captain. Steele’s greatest day as Devils captain was actually before he was officially appointed to the role. After the Devils captain Pendlebury suffered a hairline fracture late in the 2021 ORFFA home and away season vice-captain Steele had captaincy duties for the remainder of the season. Led by a best afield 129 points from acting captain Steele in the M1 position in the 2021 Grand Final Cradle Mountain defeated Venus Bay 1,466 to 1,390 to win the club’s first and so far only ORFFA premiership.

To determine their leadership structure for the 2026 ORFFA season the Devils playing group had a vote late in the pre-season. The results of the vote can be summarised in two words – Toby’s rule! The overwhelming choice of the playing group was for the clubs Toby duo to hold the top two leadership titles at CMD. Tasmanian Toby Nankervis was appointed captain and Toby Greene was named vice-captain. Traditionally the Devils have had a leadership group of four or five players including a captain and vice-captain but are going old school in 2026 with Toby squared to be the only two players to hold official leadership titles this season.

With pick 23 at the 2014 Pre-Season draft Cradle Mountain took a calculated risk by selecting 19 year Tasmanian ruckman Toby Nankervis. The Devils wanted to recruit a Tasmanian who could be a long-term member of the club’s best 15 and also wanted a long-term ruckman, Nankervis filled both needs. As expected it was a very slow burn, however big Nank flourishing and establishing himself as the Devils number 1 ruck in 2017 coincided with the club having only their second top 8 finish of their ORFFA history in 2017. With Nankervis as Cradle Mountain’s captain the club will attempt to record their 10th consecutive top eight finish in 2026. Experienced forward Toby Greene is in his second season at the Devils after joining the club during the 2025 pre-season draft from the Venus Bay Vultures in exchange for pick 26 in that draft. After impressing with his on field play and leadership in his first season at the Devils in 2025 Greene was keen to have an official leadership role at the club in 2026.

Five players delisted by Cradle Mountain before the 2026 pre-season draft were undrafted at the 2026 PSD – defender trio Jake Lever, Tom McDonald, and Brennan Cox along with small forward duo Jamie Cripps and Jamie Elliot. The Devils thank this quintet for their performances in the ORFFA and all five players will remain at Cradle Mountain to play in the club’s team in the Tasmanian State League. After being selected with pick 19 at the 2015 PSD defender Jake Lever made a significant contribution playing 11 seasons in the ORFFA for Cradle Mountain. The best season of Lever’s career was 2021 when he was a member of the Devils premiership side, played all 20 games for the season, was CMD’s second best player on Grand Final day with 126 SC points and finished fourth in the Devils 2021 best and fairest. In addition to his playing duties Lever will also take on a coaching role with Cradle Mountain’s defender trio Sam Banks, Reuben Ginbey and Ryan Maric who are all under 23 years of age at the start of the 2026 ORFFA season.

 

Battlers squad to face Bandit and his mob.

DEF: Joel Jeffrey, Heath Chapman, Lachie Jaques, Josh Lindsay (Jacob Farrow)
MID: Bailey Smith, Matthew Kennedy, James Rowbottom, Cooper Lord (Conor Nash)
RUC: Tom De Koning
FWD: Dylan Moore, Harry McKay, Bailey Humphrey, Sam Flanders (Ben Ainsworth)
IC: Xavier Lindsay, Bruce Reville (Logan McDonald)