May looked around and while a few clubs kicked the tyres, they ultimately were not drawn to a player, even a two-time All-Australian, who would be 34 by round one.
That trade period happened with the knowledge that May was facing police charges over an alleged assault in Sorrento. They are charges that he and his co-accused, Dion Prestia of Richmond, both strenuously deny. They claim they were not present at the alleged brawl and have asked the court to withdraw the charges. That is an application they will renew at the next hearing.
Content to play out his contract, May returned to Melbourne for pre-season. Then earlier this year, police had occasion to be called to his house. While he has been dealing with a range of personal issues, May had not trained with the club since that day.
May wanted to sort his personal life out off the field and with the season closing fast, Melbourne were just as eager to settle matters with him and not miss the opportunity to add another player to their list before the supplementary selection window closed on Monday afternoon. By Sunday night, the club and May’s manager Dave Trotter had reached a financial agreement and May retired.
The timing of the formal retirement meant the Demons had time to add another player to their list, which they did immediately by signing Paddy Cross, who had been training with them over the summer.
May’s retirement is the last of the big name changes under the Melbourne revolution of the last 12 months.
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The club with a new president, coach, CEO and executive head of football has now parted with a third of its biggest name premiership players.
But in truth Melbourne have undergone a quiet list rebuild for the last five years, commencing obviously under Simon Goodwin. At every opportunity, the Demons list manager Tim Lamb, who was recently courted by Adelaide to take the job of Justin Reid who has gone to the AFL, and recruiter Jason Taylor have traded for early draft picks.
Since 2021 the Demons have added eight first round draft picks – Jacob Van Rooyen, Xavier Lindsay, Matt Jefferson, Latrelle Pickett, Harvey Langford, Koltyn Tholstrup Caleb Windsor and Xavier Taylor – and they have two first-round picks already in this year’s draft. Their quiet rebuild just got loud in the last trade period.
The players playing under King in key roles will be obviously be significantly different to under Goodwin.
The style of game they play will also be vastly different: much faster and more attacking. Not as reliant on winning stoppages as they were under Goodwin, they want faster ball movement and more freedom for players to play on instinct, albeit within the confines of a rolling formation. They talk more of multi-positional players than players stuck in traditional roles.
The training loads have jumped with much higher intensity and high-speed running in football drills. How many players break down with injury will be interesting.
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May’s departure cannot be considered outside the context of a club that has invited change on itself. But there should be space to appreciate what he had been as a player and what he achieved.
May for a period was as good as any key defender in the game. Out of Darwin, he was a foundation player at Gold Coast and went on to jointly captain that fledgling club before going to Melbourne where he won those two All-Australians and the drought-breaking premiership.
The timing was nonetheless right for May to come to the decision he did on Sunday. He knew he needed to go – for his own sake and for the club’s.
