FOOTBALL<\/p>\n
By LIAM DURKIN<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
CRUEL irony has a new definition.<\/p>\n
Morwell Football-Netball Club has lost prized recruit Will Lewis in one of the more dramatic turn of events.<\/p>\n
Lewis was added to the Western Bulldogs\u2019 list, taking the spot vacated by James Harmes \u2013 the same Harmes who has joined Moe for this year\u2019s Gippsland League season.<\/p>\n
Lewis, 26, played in a VFL flag for Footscray last season, and had been training with the Dogs this preseason.<\/p>\n
Western Bulldogs Player Acquisition and Strategy Manager Michael Regan said it was great to bring Lewis into the AFL program.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re really pleased to bring Will onto the list,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a great story of perseverance for Will and another representation of the positive impact our VFL program continues to have on the development of our players.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe has put together consistent seasons with the support of people like Stewart Edge and Alex Johnson, readying him for the next step in his football journey.\u201d<\/p>\n
The man himself said it had been a surreal few days.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m obviously over the moon \u2013 I haven\u2019t wiped the smile off my face since I found out,\u201d Lewis said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been pinching myself \u2026 I can\u2019t actually believe what\u2019s happened in the last little bit.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been working as an engineer the last five years, and then playing here (with Footscray). To then get the opportunity to train over the last couple of weeks here and get the list spot now \u2026 it\u2019s been a long journey to get here, but one that I\u2019ve thoroughly enjoyed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Moe has not escaped the Harmes discussion entirely, after reports emerged the Melbourne premiership player wanted to continue his AFL career.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was left with no choice but to retire,\u201d AFL newshound Tom Morris said on SEN last Friday (March 6).<\/p>\n
\u201cHarmes wanted to play on \u2013 let me make that very clear. He was desperate to do so.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe also acknowledged that he stuffed a few things up, but he wanted one more chance and the Dogs were very firm in telling him that he\u2019d lost the trust of the players and that he should retire.\u201d<\/p>\n
The revelation was queried by show host Kane Cornes, who asked \u201ccan you tell us what he admitted?\u201d<\/p>\n
Morris replied that he couldn\u2019t provide an answer.<\/p>\n
A Moe official close to Harmes dismissed the allegations when asked by this masthead.<\/p>\n
Moe FNC president Mat Howlett was on record last week saying the club \u201calways\u201d did its due diligence when signing a player.<\/p>\n
While Morris is a polarising journalist, his track record is hard to argue against.<\/p>\n
He was first with news of Damien Hardwick\u2019s departure as Richmond coach in 2023, going with the story before even the Richmond players knew.<\/p>\n
Morris\u2019 fiery encounter with Western Bulldogs coach Luke Beveridge in 2022 all but confirms the journalist knows people in high places inside the four walls at Whitten Oval as well.<\/p>\n
Beveridge\u2019s outburst was nothing however compared to former Australian leg spinner (the country\u2019s greatest living leggie?) Stuart MacGill\u2019s meltdown for the ages on the Cricket Unfiltered podcast last week.<\/p>\n
MacGill was bizarrely set off after the topic of Candice Warner\u2019s scandal with Sonny Bill Williams was raised, leading to an early end to the episode.<\/p>\n
MacGill\u2019s temper actually flared earlier in the episode while discussing Gippsland\u2019s own Sophie Molineux\u2019s elevation to the Australian captaincy, despite her long injury history.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was the best option, you are nobody in the big scheme of things, you\u2019ve just got to understand that mate,\u201d MacGill said, exploding on show host Andrew Menczel.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s just in the best XI,\u201d Menczel maintained.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo you\u2019re hoping that Sophie Molineux got an injury so that you could be right,\u201d MacGill hit back.<\/p>\n
Keeping the controversy going, former Gippsland Power coach Nick Stevens fronted court last week, accused of ripping more than $170,000 from customers in undelivered swimming pools.<\/p>\n
He has pleaded not guilty to 18 charges, according to the Herald Sun.<\/p>\n
The trial against the 200-game Port Adelaide and Carlton player continues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FOOTBALL By LIAM DURKIN \u00a0 CRUEL irony has a new definition. Morwell Football-Netball Club has lost prized recruit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":530125,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,14385,3420,5337,675,263377,263378,263379,263380,128346,85,213316,1144,698,263381],"class_list":["post-530124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-damien-hardwick","tag-gippsland-power","tag-james-harmes","tag-kane-cornes","tag-matt-howlett","tag-moe-fnc","tag-morwell-fnc","tag-nick-stevens","tag-sophie-molineux","tag-sports","tag-stuart-macgill","tag-tom-morris","tag-western-bulldogs","tag-will-lewis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530124","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=530124"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530124\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/530125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=530124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=530124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=530124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}