Kangaroos amass warchest to buy superstars
NORTH Melbourne chairman Ben Buckley has vowed his club will be the most aggressive pursuer of talent in this year’s free agency window, saying the Kangaroos have salary room to secure two $1 million-plus superstars.
Refusing to be dissuaded by its near miss with Dustin Martin last year, or by the “professional tension” their audacious approach to Martin and others brought with rival teams, Buckley said the Kangaroos will push every bit as hard this year.
And he hasn’t ruled out launching another bid for star Giants midfielder Josh Kelly — the son of former Kangaroo Phil Kelly — when he comes out of contract at the end of next season.
“We will continue to be bold and assertive in bringing the best possible talent into the club,” Buckley said. “There has been lots of things written about our approach to Dustin; we obviously put a lot of effort into that, and we respect Dustin’s decision and wish him extremely well.
“But we won’t let the fact we didn’t get him stop us from approaching others in the future.
“We will be extremely active in the free agency area (this year) as much as anyone else — if not more. Our supporters would expect nothing less and our team would expect nothing less.
“We clearly have substantive room to attract elite players. We won’t use that just because we have it, but we will use it to attract the right players ... the best players.”
Buckley would not identify the players the club had on its radar, but the hit list is certain to include Gold Coast co-captain Tom Lynch, Adelaide star Rory Sloane, West Coast duo Andrew Gaff and Jeremy McGovern and Melbourne key-position player Tom McDonald.
While the Kangaroos missed out on a big target last year, the club has a long tradition of chasing — and securing — big names across their history, including claiming three stars Barry Davis, Doug Wade and John Rantall during in the early 1970s, and securing the Krakouer brothers in the early 1980s.
Buckley acknowledged rival clubs may not deal with the audacious courting of their players, but said those tensions would never stand in the Kangaroos’ way of building their list.
Asked whether Kelly, who knocked back a lucrative offer from North last year to sign a two-year deal with the Giants, was still a long-range target — Buckley said: “We will see in two years ... I reckon every club in the competition will be looking at a player like Josh Kelly.”