Dismayed North Melbourne fans have launched an online campaign aimed at convincing the AFL club to offer veteran Brent Harvey a contract extension.
Harvey, who recently broke the AFL’s games record, and three other veteran players – Drew Petrie, Michael Firrito and Nick Dal Santo – were told on Wednesday that their services will no longer be required by the club when the 2016 season comes to its conclusion.
There has been a fierce backlash to the decision to axe the quartet – which North coach Brad Scott admitted was “heartbreaking” – and by mid-morning on Thursday, a petition to win Harvey a further 12 months at the club had been signed by over 2,000 fans.
Harvey, 38, has expressed a desire to play on beyond the current season having passed Michael Tuck’s all-time games record in round 19 earlier this year. He has played on one-year contracts since 2009.
Lynda Harmer, a Kangaroos fan who started the petition, said Harvey deserved to retire on his own terms and that his current form warrants an extension to his deal.
“He consistently performs at high standard and his presence on the field has the ability to ignite his team-mates,” she wrote. “He is currently ranked in the top 50 players in the AFL and pulls stats week in week out that are better than players 15 years his junior.
“Let Boomer play on in 2017 – its what he wants and its what the members want.”
Should North stand firm in the face of the backlash, Harvey faces two options: retire or switch to another club. But his manager, Shane Casley, said there will be no decision on his client’s future until the end of the season.
“We’ll catch up once the season is over and chat about all that,” Casley told RSN927 on Thursday. “I wouldn’t expect that they will while the footy season is on.
“From Boomer’s point of view if he’s playing good footy, his body is right and his mind is right then he would want to go on,” Casley said. “We think he ticks all the boxes to go on. And from that point of view he would like to.”
Having played 430 games for North Melbourne during a 20-season career, the thought of Harvey pulling on another team’s guernsey is a foreign one, but one which Kangaroos fans may now have to consider.
“It’s a hard question,” Casley said. “He certainly did a couple of years ago when contract discussions stalled with the Kangaroos. The Hawks did approach us and we considered it.
“This is another two or three years on, it’s a lot further down the track. It would be a long shot I would have thought but we haven’t had that chat.”
