The Tasmania Devils’ inaugural season in the VFL was officially launched at an event in Hobart on Saturday, with all eyes now turning to North Hobart Oval this coming weekend.
The Devils’ men’s VFL team will make their debut on Saturday at North Hobart Oval, marking the first step in the state’s journey to competing in the AFL from 2028.
Saturday’s launch came after months of intensive preparation, with the team’s practice match against Werribee in Melbourne on March 6 providing encouragement despite a narrow loss.
“We were pretty pleased with how [it] went,” leadership group member Caleb Mitchell said.
“The fact that we only went down by a few goals against Werribee, and we keep building from that, but we understand there’s a lot of work to go.”
With over 11,000 punters expected at Saturday’s game, club officials acknowledged the rapid timeline from concept to reality.
“It’s actually much bigger than just VFL,” club CEO Brendon Gale said.
“This is the beginning of our runway to AFL in round one ’28.”
“It’s hard to believe it’s come around so quickly, but the next couple of years is going to be really important.”
Gale said he intends to put his “entire organisation” under “as much pressure as possible to really reveal and find out what we’re made of”.
He said he hopes to “iterate and learn and sharpen that edge” to prepare the club for its AFL entry in 2028.
The women’s VFLW team will begin their season later this year, with players supporting the men’s debut.
Tasmanian Meghan Gaffney, who played for the GWS Giants in the AFLW, said the transition back to Tasmania after playing interstate had been significant.
“It was a big transition moving from Tassie to Sydney and then I didn’t think it was going to be a transition moving back from Sydney to Tassie, but it definitely was,” she said.
“I’m settled back in now and I’m really loving how supportive Tassie is of AFL and how much the state just gets around it.”
She said the VFLW team is “really excited for the boys to kick the season off”.
“Quite a few of the girls, if not all of them, are going to come down and support the team because yeah, we like to think that we’re one club.”
Tickets remain on sale for this Saturday’s game, priced at $10 for adults and $5 for children and concession card holders.
