Nick Meese is the cult figure of Williamstown’s premiership team.
The solid ruckman generates the most noise among doting commentators, the loudest cheers from the Seagulls fans and the biggest hugs from his teammates.
Decked out in the No. 49 guernsey, standing at a small 197cm for a starting ruckman and weighing in around 105kg, Meese comes face to face with the most athletic, young up-and- coming ruckmen the AFL has to offer, and beats them most times.
Meese, 27, is a smart operator, using strength and guile to win his taps. He makes the most of his undersize status by following up at ground level as well as any big man in the competition.
“I’ve just got to get my hands dirty and play to my strengths,” Meese told Star Weekly.
He was one of the standouts for the Seagulls in the grand final win over Box Hill Hawks on Sunday, managing 29 hit-outs against Jonathon Ceglar, who stands seven centimetres taller and was in contention for a call-up to Hawthorn’s AFL grand final side.
Meese finished with 13 possessions, nine clearances and five tackles, getting stronger as the game wore on.
“It was just hard work. Ceglar is a great player and I just tried to do my best on him. I think I had a decent third quarter, which we all did, which really cemented our lead.”
While the Seagulls depend on Meese to shoulder the bulk of the big-man duties, the ruckman depends on his partner-in-crime, Sean Tighe, to be able to run out the games.
Tighe is a younger and athletic version, and dangerous as a resting forward. Their different styles make them ideal as a ruck tag team.
“It’s not just me,” Meese said. “It’s because of him, it’s because of us two working as a team to overpower these monsters, that’s how we get it done.
“When you come to the end of the game, when you collectively look at the ruck stats, we go all right.”
It must have been strange for Meese’s family to see him receiving a premiership medal at Williamstown.
He got his start in the VFL at the Northern Bullants, offspring of the Preston Bullants, where his dad John, grandfather Reg, and uncle Adrian Marcon, father of Seagulls teammate Adam, played their football.
With his former club’s alignment with Carlton, Meese saw better opportunities to ply his trade at Williamstown, a decision he wasn’t regretting on Sunday.
While his teammates were starting their celebrations out on the ground, Meese only let the euphoria sink in once he had returned to the change rooms.
“The boys were giving me a bit of stick. The whole way through the last term I was saying, ‘settle down, relax, it’s not done till it’s done’, and we were up by 50 points,” he said with a laugh.
“I was just that paranoid that something could happen. It’s just starting to sink in now. It was huge, absolutely huge.”
