The hallowed turf of the Melbourne Cricket Ground, the Colosseum of Australian sport.
Pulling on the famous red and blue of Australia’s oldest football club on the home of our native game should be a dream come true.
But for Leitchville’s Marty Hore, one thing was missing from this dream come true — a victory.
‘‘It was fantastic to be out there as an AFL player,’’ he said.
‘‘But this is a team sport, we play to win games of football and, unfortunately, we weren’t able to get the that today.’’
The highly fancied Melbourne went down on Saturday by 26 points to a new-look Port Adelaide, sans co-captain Ollie Wines.
But for Hore, the day was still one to remember.
‘‘I was lucky because I had the entire family down,’’ he said.
‘‘It’s a pretty special moment in my life, so being able to have my family there to watch me is something I will always cherish.
‘‘We are also pretty lucky that there wasn’t a lot of other football going on this weekend so a lot of other people were able to get down and watch the game.’’
Hore, by his own admission, took some time to adjust to the level, but produced a strong performance.
‘‘In the early stages I was a bit star struck by the fact I was on the MCG in an AFL game,’’ he said.
‘‘The jump in terms of quality, even from the VFL, is huge. The skills are a lot sharper and the pace of the match a lot quicker, so it takes time to adapt, but I was able to get myself into the game.’’
Hore finished with 14 disposals, as well as two marks and a tackle.
‘‘We didn’t look at it individually after the game,’’ he said.
‘‘It wasn’t a case of Goody (Melbourne coach Simon Goodwin) telling me personally what I had done, we looked at the team performance and what we can do as a football club to improve.
‘‘We have had personal recovery on Sunday and will move into team recovery on Monday. I was pretty sore, I had a few corkies but that comes with the territory. I’ll put my recovery work in this week and look towards next week.’’
With the Demons looking heading to one of the toughest asks in the competition — Geelong in Geelong — Hore knows the season isn’t going to get any easier.
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