\n North Melbourne’s match simulation on Friday cancelled due to gastro outbreak\n <\/p>\n
A general scene at North Melbourne training during the 2025-26 pre-season. Picture: North Melbourne FC<\/p>\n
A GASTRO outbreak has hit North Melbourne, forcing Friday morning’s match simulation session to be called off at the last minute.<\/p>\n
The number of Kangas to have gone down is understood to be in the double figures, forcing club officials to halt plans for a significant training session.<\/p>\n
A barebones group was still set to do light duties at Arden Street across the morning, but the cancellation of a full-blown match sim outing will be a frustration for coach Alastair Clarkson as the side ramps up its pre-season preparations.<\/p>\n
North Melbourne had otherwise enjoyed a relatively clean summer on the fitness front, with youngster Jackson Archer’s ACL injury the side’s most significant setback.<\/p>\n
Callum Coleman-Jones (calf), Aidan Corr (calf) and new recruit Charlie Spargo (shoulder) have also endured injury issues, but had plans to reintegrate back into main training ahead of round one.<\/p>\n
Charlie Spargo after joining North Melbourne from Melbourne ahead of the 2026 season. Picture: North Melbourne FC<\/p>\n
North Melbourne will take part in a full intraclub hitout on February 13, before practice matches against Melbourne at Casey Fields on February 20 and Collingwood at Mars Stadium in Ballarat on March 1.<\/p>\n
The Kangas will then open their 2026 campaign with a round one clash against Port Adelaide at Marvel Stadium on March 15.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"North Melbourne’s match simulation on Friday cancelled due to gastro outbreak A general scene at North Melbourne training…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":433675,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85,83],"class_list":{"0":"post-433674","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-afl","8":"tag-afl","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-australian-football-league","12":"tag-australianfootballleague","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-text"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433674","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=433674"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433674\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/433675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=433674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=433674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=433674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}