“He’s a weapon”: Dockers hint at positional change for star amid midfield logjam

Fremantle look poised to throw the magnets around ahead of the 2026 season, with Western Australia Origin midfielder Jaeger O'Meara revealing that star Hayden Young could be sent forward for Justin Longmuir's side.

Young had a difficult 2025, playing just nine games after dealing with a number of injury setbacks.

However, his reduced fitness meant Longmuir could experiment with the 24-year-old in varying positions around the ground, often finding Young's versatility useful.

O'Meara pointed to this while speaking to SEN on Saturday.

"I think Hayden is well-suited to playing as a forward," O'Meara said.

"He's obviously played half-back in the early part of his career, so he's got the option to do that as well. He's certainly a weapon for us.

"All of our assistants want him in their own lines, so we'll see what happens."

Of Young's 17.2 possessions per game in 2025, 8.4 came in the forward half of the ground on average, with 6.2 coming from the attacking midfield. That follows a similar trend to his role in 2024, where he averaged over 11 forward-half possessions per game.

Notably, in Round 20 against West Coast last year, Young was placed up forward predominantly, attending just 50 per cent of centre bounces for the game. Despite a lesser role in the midfield, he still produced 23 disposals, kicked three goals and contributed eight score involvements, highlighting how damaging he can be in a dynamic attacking role further up the ground.

Although not ideal, Young's injury-riddled campaign was a silver lining for the Dockers, giving them flexibility through different areas of the ground heading into 2026, with several players stepping up to fill the void left in the midfield.

O'Meara highlighted some of those options and how they could transform Fremantle's line-ups in 2026.

"We do have a lot of depth in the midfield at the minute with some of our younger guys coming through as well, with [Neil] Erasmus, [Matthew] Johnson and [Nathan] O'Driscoll," O'Meara said.

"We've got a few guys who can go through the middle of the ground, which means that our boys who play through there will have to take on multiple positions."

Young addressed this in December last year, too, indicating his new dynamic role that O'Meara confirmed could be seen during the year.

"Other players had to step up, we saw what Corey Wagner did… Shai Bolton went through there, and now Murphy Reid has the opportunity to float through there," Young said. 

“It's great for Caleb [Serong], Andy [Brayshaw] and myself to be able to flip forward at times or throw different things at the opposition.”

Young and the Dockers can test these positional changes for premiership points in Round 1, when Fremantle travel to take on Geelong at GMHBA Stadium on March 14.