{"id":637240,"date":"2026-04-28T23:50:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-28T23:50:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/637240\/"},"modified":"2026-04-28T23:50:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T23:50:11","slug":"pair-of-afl-legends-to-host-disney-new-footy-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/637240\/","title":{"rendered":"Pair of AFL legends to host Disney+ new footy show"},"content":{"rendered":"

AFL<\/a> legends and premiership duo James Hird<\/a> and Dermott Brereton will host a new football show on ESPN, debuting on Wednesday, 29 April.<\/p>\n

Launching on\u00a0Disney+, Hird and Brereton will be the latest to join a footy panel show, called\u00a0ESPN Footy Central – providing fans a fresh take on the biggest AFL<\/a> stories whilst previewing the upcoming weekend of football.<\/p>\n

The pair feature heavily across Channel Nine, with Hird holding a spot on Footy Classified\u00a0as well as Sunday’s\u00a0Footy Furnace.<\/p>\n

Brereton rejoined Channel Nine ahead of the 2026 season<\/a> after a 14-year stint with\u00a0Fox Footy.\u00a0The Hawthorn great appears on\u00a0Footy Classified from time to time.<\/p>\n

“The opportunity for the analytical side of football had dried up at Fox but with Channel 9 now it gives me that opportunity once again and that’s super super pleasing to me,” Brereton said in March according to News Corp.<\/p>\n

“I have a way of viewing the game a certain way and it’s always been my strength in football. I’m happy wherever they want me.”<\/p>\n

Brereton has also continued his partnership with\u00a0SEN Radio.<\/p>\n

He was one of the most popular footballers in the 1980s and 1990s, playing 189 games for Hawthorn in its gold era.<\/p>\n

Brereton kicked 427 goals in the brown and gold, also claiming five flags, a best and fairest (1985) and two nods in the VFL Team of the Year.<\/p>\n

He completed his career with one year at Sydney (1994) and Collingwood (1995) before retiring.<\/p>\n

As for Hird, he played 253 games for the Bombers, claiming two flags, a Brownlow Medal, five All-Australian blazers, five best and fairest, a Norm Smith Medal and captained the club for eight seasons.<\/p>\n

He also coached Essendon for four seasons, which was marred by the drug scandal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AFL legends and premiership duo James Hird and Dermott Brereton will host a new football show on ESPN,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":637241,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-637240","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-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/637240","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=637240"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/637240\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/637241"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=637240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=637240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=637240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}