Sport
12 June, 2026
MCDFNL’s junior football stars ready to battle North Central this weekend
The MCDFNL has assembled two all-star junior football teams that will take on the North Central Football League this Sunday in what’s expected to be an exciting interleague clash.
St Arnaud’s Lord Nelson Park will be the stage for some potential footballing greats to showcase their talent against elite competition, with the under 15s kicking off at 10 am before the under 18s play at 11.30 am.
After local junior footballers registered their interest in participating, the selection process began with a month-long Rookie Me Program before several tryout training sessions.
Final squads were finalised following a final training session on Wednesday night, with nine clubs represented across both teams.
Carisbrook is heavily represented in the under 15s and under 18s, with an extraordinary 17 players selected for this weekend.
The under 15s squad, coached by Natte Bealiba’s Trent Mortlock, is hoping to build on a mixed interleague campaign last year where they defeated the Horsham District Football Netball League before losing to North Central by 86 points.
Mortlock said the interleague program is a brilliant opportunity for aspiring local footballers to test their abilities.
“It gives the juniors a good platform to test and better themselves against quality players and progress through those junior ranks,” he said.
“I tried to get down and watch the Rookie Me program and also try to watch as many under 15 games as I can to try and not just pick kids off a few weeks of training.
“Everyone likes to be a midfielder or a certain position, but when you get to that next step of footy, you might get tried out in a spot that you’ve never necessarily played before or a slightly different role.
“There’s plenty of good, talented kids in the local competition that are going to benefit from some more exposure.”
After opening 2026 by kicking an eye-popping 39 goals in Carisbrook’s first eight matches in under 15s, Mortlock expects Billy Rumpff to lead from the front and build upon his strong showings at interleague level last season.
“Billy is one of the kids who’s going through some talent pathways with the Bendigo Pioneers and a local at Carisbrook, so it’ll be exciting to see him,” he said.
“I’m looking forward to seeing Judd Ross from Natte. I get to watch him every week, so I’ll be good to see him go up against some bigger and more talented kids.
“There’s also a strong contingent of boys from Trentham that are all highly skilled.”
Alongside the return of coach Michael Pratt, now joined by Daniel Wridgeway, nine players have been reselected from last year’s under 18’s squad that earned a victory over Horsham and drew with North Central in interleague play last season.
Pratt said the combination of that established core, mixed with some hungry new players, has created an evenly balanced squad.
“A lot of them are returning faces from last year’s team that I coached, so it was good to see them and there’s quite a lot of potential future leaders out there and good decision-makers with the ball,” he said.
“There are quite a few that missed out (last year) that will be in the team this year, so they’ve obviously gone back and worked with their home clubs on what we taught them that we thought was extremely useful to use at the next level.”
Several players selected for the under 18s are already making an impact for their club’s senior squad.
Carisbrook’s Ty Sanders, Chardy Bond and Locky Llewellyn have all made sporadic appearances at the senior level this season, while Trentham’s Jayke Bunn and Avoca’s Mitchell Wardlaw have earned regular roles with their play this season.
Tadgh Cananzi has played in every Maldon senior game this season since returning from Castlemaine and Talbot’s Zac Cicchini continues to excite after kicking 38 goals in his debut senior campaign last year.
“Cicchini was one of our better players last year and he’ll be up there again. Elliot Cullinan is very elite and quick for his height,” Pratt said.
“Wardlaw has quite a lot of future leadership in him. I’ve hardly seen him play because he was bottom age last year, but I reckon he’s ready to jump out and explode.”