AFL grand final 2016: Melbourne turns red, white and blue for parade to MCG

From the old Treasury, down Spring Street, along Wellington Parade, clear into the precinct that gave this parade its meaning, the MCG, the crowd wore red, white and blue.

Even the members of the Army marching band that led the great procession wore Bulldogs scarves around their necks.

​A scarf was draped over the big bass drum that gave the parade its cadence

It took a while, elbowing our way through the crowd, along Spring Street, to find a single person wearing the livery of the Sydney Swans.

"Do you feel lonely?" we asked the fellow from the north, whose name was, he said, Peter Williams.

"Not really," he said. "I've got a crew with me."

Mr Williams of Wollongong had taken a couple of days to drive down with his wife Carol and a few carloads of friends.

Some of them, he confided, weren't actually Swans supporters. They went for the GWS Giants,  but would be loyal to Sydney on Saturday.

As the parade of players and officials, fans, marching groups, and the Carlton Brewery Clydesdales drawing a wagon of barrels, swung into Wellington Parade a cheeky bunch of Bulldogs supporters held high at the corner a homemade sign.

"We will beat the Swans by a mile," it proclaimed.

"Yes we'll do them Doggies Style."

The sun shone from a blue sky, despite the dire predictions by weather forecasters all week of rain upon the parade.

But this was the AFL Grand Final Parade. Melbourne was out for the Bulldogs. There would be no rain.

This was a town in search of a fairytale, and the sky had delivered the first stage of it. 

It was not the perfect fairytale ending for the Bulldogs' Matthew Suckling who has not been selected to play on Saturday, though he was hiding any disappointment.

"I'm happy for the boys, they've been tremendous all year," he said at the parade.

"I probably knew earlier in the week [he was unlikely to be selected], my preparation has been pretty ordinary in the second half of the year.

"The Achilles was right to go, I put my hand up to play, but it's obviously affected my last month or so that came into it."

Western Bulldogs' ruckman Jordan Roughead had also been in doubt to play in the grand final after suffering an eye injury in his team's preliminary final win over Greater Western Sydney.

The ball hit hard Roughead hard in the right eye and he spent the early part of this week resting in a dark room.

He wore sunglasses to the grand final parade on Friday, but said his vision had returned and he was ready to play.

"I've been driving around the Western suburbs, there's red, white and blue everywhere," he said.

"It's a long and not hugely successful history, but we're hoping we can add to that tomorrow."

In form Bulldogs' speedster Jason Johannisen said after a mid-season injury, he had found a way to again play with consistency in the past few weeks.

"The fans have been tremendous, it started yesterday at training with a packed house at Whitten Oval, I'm definitely feeling a part of the build up and just excited," he said.

Jake Stringer said the Western Bulldogs players were keeping their nerves under control - their past three games could have seen them eliminated, so they were used to the pressure.

He said starting well would be important against the Swans.

"They start exceptionally well, so if we can match them early it'll hold us in really good stead," he said.

Veteran Dale Morris was enjoying the day with his sons Riley and Charlie. He said it was great to train in front of 10,000 Doggies fans this week.

"You embrace it and you go with it, it does lift you quite a bit, to show what we've done and how it's affected so many people, how excited they are, it's pretty special," he said.
 

Meanwhile, Sydney superstar Lance Franklin is preparing for his fifth grand final, and the former Hawthorn champion said the Swan youngsters had handled the week well. Being away from Melbourne for most of the week helped significantly.

"Having a lot of leaders around the football club and then the coaches, everyone's kept them pretty grounded. It does help being in Sydney though. You're sort of away from the bubble of football, and you can go about your stuff," Franklin said.

Emerging Swans forward Xavier Richards was getting ready for his first grand final.

"It's kind of surreal thinking that I'm in this position. I couldn't have imagined myself in this position three months ago," Richards said.

Young Swan and Rising Star winner Callum Mills hurt his hamstring three weeks in the qualifying final and thought his season was over.

"I probably thought the worst [initially]," Mills said.

But he recovered sufficiently to earn his place in the team for Saturday's game. His recall was confirmed on Thursday afternoon.

"It was very exciting for myself and my family," Mills said.

Swans co-captain Jarrad McVeigh passed his final fitness test on Friday morning, with the club making a final call on selection before the parade to kill the prospect of a last-minute distraction.

"We didn't want to wait until Saturday. It wouldn't be fair to me to not know, and to someone else," McVeigh said.

On injured defender Aliir Aliir: "It's disappointing for him, but he's a big reason why we're here today," McVeigh said.

And on omitted youngster Harry Marsh: "There's always hard-luck stories. The way he's carried himself this week is unbelievable. He's a valued member of our footy team."