DIDAK: playing through pain
Alan Didak no longer wants to move to a permanent midfield role, the Magpie matchwinner content to play predominantly across half-forward, the Herald Sun reports.

Didak revealed the pain he endured after suffering a shoulder injury in round 21 last season.

He believed his chances of playing in a Collingwood premiership had slipped away, and that he had played through the finals with a pectoral muscle in his shoulder ripped from the bone.

He said the club surgeon had given him two options - surgery straight away, and miss the finals, or try to play. Didak said: "I, of course, said: 'I want to try'."

He not only played, in pain and in heavy strapping, but nobody watching would have know the stresses he was going through.

He underwent surgery immediately after the Replay, and now has a 10cm scar to show for it - as well as the medal he has been attempting to win after being part of Collingwood's losing GF teams of 2002 and 2003.

"It's a massive relief," he said. "I've finally achieved something that I've always wanted to achieve.

"The younger players are probably thinking it's going to happen again and as a young player back in '02 and '03, I thought it was just going to happen as well.

"It doesn't just happen. Teams improve and we lose a couple of players, things can happen - and we've already lost one of our best defenders (Nathan Brown).

"You become the hunted and we've just got to realise it's not just going to happen."

Didak, 28 last week, has played 182 games and kicked 256 goals for the Magpies since being recruited from the Port Adelaide Magpies in 2001.

Nixon regrets "inappropriate" dealings with teenage girl
The sad story of a teenage girl and her connection with the world of football took another twist overnight, when leading player manager Ricky Nixon admitted to the Herald Sun that he had had "inappropriate" dealings with the girl.

Nixon is quoted in the Herald Sun as saying: "In hindsight my dealings with this girl were inappropriate and I regret them," he said. "I won't be seeing her again."

This was another example of she said, he said regarding the extent of those "dealings" but with an extra step.

Nixon manages Nick Riewoldt whose unauthorised image was published by the girl in question on her Facebook page in December.

The Herald Sun website also published a video of Nixon, under the headline: 'Nixon leaves hotel after visiting photo girl.'

The thought of public figures in the AFL community under video surveillance will surely raise the stakes in the battle currently being raised by the AFLPA and senior players over their right to privacy.

Only this week, Geelong captain Cameron Ling expressed concerns over the creeping scrutiny of players in a lengthy interview in The Age.

He said: "It's probably one of the biggest things, that constant scrutiny of you off the field, prying into your private lives, that feeling of lack of privacy."

"We talk about it at the footy club. We believe it drives people to retirement quicker than anything.

"A lot of our guys are talking about retirement in the next year, two years, three years, because they're just sick of that sort of stuff."

The end for 'Fev'?
Privacy issues, and the role of compassion were also front and centre in The Age, Herald Sun and Courier Mail, with stories suggesting that the Brisbane Lions were set to axe troubled forward Brendan Fevola.

It was widely reported that Lions officials had met with the AFL on Friday to discuss where Fevola's contract (with two years to run) might sit in the club's salary cap, should it dispense with his services.

Fevola's manager, former Lion champion forward Alastair Lynch, revealed this week that Fevola had been suffering depression. Fevola has been in a rehab centre since being arrested and charged for public nuisance and obstructing police at 4.30am on New Year's Day.

His unruly behaviour has been well reported, and extends over many years - much of it before his recruitment by the Lions at the end of the 2009 season, after a turbulent, but personally successful, career with Carlton.

Fevola is clearly in a bad space, with issues involving alcohol, gambling addictions, a marriage breakdown and the overarching concern of the ravages of depression.

It remains to be seen what the Lions will decide; no doubt this has been a difficult time for the club, torn between the need to nurture a powerful winning culture, and to take care of a player who may well be lost without the community of players, coaches and officials that has supported him through many difficult moments.

Purple haze is spreading
Fremantle is close to selling all its reserved seats at Patersons Stadium, something it has only done once before, in 2007, The West Australian reports.

As of Thursday, Fremantle had sold nearly 37,000 reserved seat memberships to its  11 home games this season, with just a further 1500 seats available, while West Coast had again filled all of its reserved seat allocation, with another 8000 people on its waiting list.

The report said the strong demand for reserved seats among West Australian footy fans highlighted the need for a bigger stadium, either a revamped Patersons Stadium or a new venue.

If Fremantle sells out its reserved seating, the report said, "West Australians will be faced with less access to their major sporting venue than at any point in history."

This is something the AFL is acutely aware of. It knows the facilities in WA have fallen behind those enjoyed by footy fans in all over AFL states. One of its priorities in 2011 is to work with the WA Government to rectify this.

Rodan still believes in LARS
After undergoing a second round of LARS surgery to reconstruct his left knee last November, Port Adelaide midfielder David Rodan is three to four weeks away from resuming in the SANFL, The Advertiser reports.

Rodan said he was "definitely" confident the synthetic fibres used in LARS surgery to rebuild knees would hold up second time around despite the fact his first LARS reconstruction gave way after a year.

"I'm not prepared to sit a year out and I'm very confident with LARS and Dr Tony Spriggins, my surgeon, has been a great support as has the (Port Adelaide) medical staff. Hopefully it will be a bit better this time because we've been through it before."

In short
West Coast CEO Trevor Nisbett is expecting the Eagles to show "significant improvement" on the field this season, the club's 25th in the AFL, The Age reports.

Melbourne forward Liam Jurrah put aside a bitter tribal dispute - sparked when one of his childhood friends was stabbed to death - in his remote home community of Yuendumu in the Northern Territory, to complete the first pre-season of his career, The Age reports.

Chris Mayne has overcome speech difficulties, caused by the cleft lip and palate he had as a child, to become an outspoken member of Fremantle's leadership group, The Age reports.

Sides expecting to "bash" the young Gold Coast team this year are in for a surprise according to Suns conditioning coach Dean Robinson, The Age reports.

North Melbourne forward Lachie Hansen will sport a new look this season, after deciding to keep the moustache he grew last 'Movember', the Herald Sun reports. He also intends to start a lawn-mowing business called Mo Man.

Gold Coast Suns CEO Travis Auld told the Herald Sun signing Gary Ablett gave the club "instant credibility and respect".