Bailey has recognised the form of some Demon listed players in the VFL, saying that strong performaces on the weekend may earn several players a chance against the Lions.
“We’ll probably look at a couple of changes this week… there’s a couple of blokes back in Sandy (Sandringham) whose form has been good,” he said.
“Guys like (Simon) Buckley, (Shane) Valenti, (Stefan) Martin…there’s four or five guys whose performance on the weekend was good. They’ll all be considered.”
Bailey noted that 21-year-old Stefan Martin may not be far away from making his AFL debut after some impressive performances.
“Stef’s progression has been good during the year…he’s been thereabouts… if I had to pick a top 30 at the moment, he’d be in there.”
What’s more, Bailey insisted that giving the potential debutant the job on superstar Jonathan Brown was not beyond the realms of possibility.
“Someone’s got to play on him. It’s been done before. Why wouldn’t he want to take up the challenge,” he said.
Bailey also took the opportunity to compliment Lynden Dunn, 21, who has had some big name assignments in the past few weeks including Adam Goodes, Nathan Foley and Dane Swan.
“Lynden’s a great kid. He works really hard at training. He’s had a great pre-season. He missed two or three weeks there when we had to rest him but he works really hard at it.
"I think that’s a really good sign to be mentally tough for the last three weeks. We expect him to be mentally tough for another hard job at the weekend.”
In the absence of senior players such as recently retired former captain David Neitz and the injured Russell Robertson, Bailey said he has noticed that the behaviour of the younger members of the playing group is changing.
“Certainly at training you can see more of the young players having input and starting to really get a feel for what it is to play for Melbourne. It probably started with the heroes dinner that we had. They understand the history of the club but they’re aware that they have to create their own history. They need to be the ones to get on the front foot and age is one aspect of it but the experience they’re getting is going to hold us in good stead I think.”
Coming off the back of a 40-point loss to the Swans last weekend, Bailey said that the Dees must improve their consistency if they’re to beat the Lions this weekend.
“Unfortunately the inconsistency of it has really let us down and our members down. People are coming to watch us and they’re going to enjoy when we actually put four quarters together and there’s no reason that it can’t happen this weekend.”
The coach is in no doubt as to what area of the field that his side needs to dominate in order to overcome the Lions.
“We need to win the midfield battle, there’s no doubt about that. It’s a very important part of the ground and if we can win that and stop the supply to their forwards then there’s no reason why we can’t win the game.”
As for the Demons’ plans for the upcoming break, Bailey said he hasn’t planned any extreme bonding sessions.
“They’ll obviously get a weekend off to rest but I don’t think we’ll be going deep sea diving with the sharks in a cage or anything like that,” he laughed.
