The Maryborough-Castlemaine Football and Netball League is the only one of five central Victorian leagues to embrace Easter footy and netball this year. A Good Friday clash on 7 April between Maldon and Dunolly, brought forward from round two, will be the MCDFL’s stand-alone season opener for 2023. The 14-club league was the first in north-central Victoria to formally announce its 2023 fixture.
Defending premiers are Harcourt in footy and Natte Bealiba in netball. The full round one will be played on Saturday 15April with premiers Harcourt travelling across country to Lexton while runners-up Carisbrook travel the short distance to Maryborough to play that town’s Royal Park club at Hedges Oval.
The big game in the early part of the season will be played in round five on 13 May when Carisbrook hosts Harcourt at the Carisbrook Recreation Reserve. In last year’s tumultuous grand final, during which a Carisbrook player jumped over the fence, the Harcourt Lions defeated Carisbrook: 9.4 (58) to 7.8 (50).
The season winds up on 19 August when Harcourt is at home to Natte Bealiba while Carisbrook travels to Dunolly. Finals run from late August into mid-September with the grand final scheduled for 16September.
The Heathcote District FNL, like Bendigo and North Central, has opted for a 15 April start. As the draw would have it reigning premiers Lockington Bamawm United has the opening round bye. The Cats open their season when they meet North Bendigo in round two on 22 April.
Lockington beat Mount Pleasant in the 2022 grand final by 20 points: 13.11 (89) to 10.9 (69). The two clubs meet again in the match-of-the-round on 17 June. That round is the ninth and marks the halfway point of the 2023 season.
They’ll wind up the home-and-away season with a return match on 19 August at Mounts home ground, Toolleen.
Netball reigning champions Elmore are away to Huntly in round one, but will meet 2022 runners-up White Hills in round four on 6 May. The Elmore girls won their club’s first top netball premiership in 54 years last September, but had to do it the hard way. White Hills held a 2-1 season advantage going into the big decider. But Elmore prevailed taking home their first premiership pennant since 1968.
One important position the MCDFL has taken is its stand against sports betting sponsorship. The league and its administrative body – AFL Goldfields – wants to help young people and players to recognise that sport and betting don’t have to go together
Heathcote league president Peter Cole is still hopeful an inter-league fixture can be arranged for the King’s Birthday weekend or even earlier. Unlike the North Central’s players Mr Cole believes his HDFNL footballers and netballers are keen for an inter-league clash.
And10 June date stands at the moment as the bye weekend in HDFNL action and a possible date for an inter-league day.
Reverting back to the MCDFL, officials and club volunteers will hope that nothing like last season’s grand final debacle ever occurs again. Halfway through the third quarter at Maryborough’s Princes Park a brawl between multiple spectators in the crowd broke out. To make matters worse, a Carisbrook player jumped over the fence and allegedly began punching a spectator. The skirmish developed into three separate altercations after which the player hurdled the fence again, but this time ran downfield to continue playing.
He was immediately shown a red card and tossed out of the grand final by the central umpire in that part of the ground as the police moved-on three spectators and evicted them. No formal reports of assaults on police or serious injuries to fans were reported.
Police at the ground said the behaviour of the player who threw punches in front of the grandstand was sparked “by inappropriate comments of a very personal and sensitive nature directed to a sick daughter.”
Five weeks later at the league’s Tribunal hearing the Carisbrook player was outed for 10 matches with four of those weeks suspended. That means he’ll miss the first six weeks of the Redbacks’ 2023 season.
As for the spectators involved one was banned from attending AFL Victoria matches for 12 months while a second person will be unable to attend the first six home-and-away rounds in 2023.
australianrules.com.au 