Bastinac set for resurgent Roos- New Roo Ryan Bastinac with, from left, dad Peter, mum Sandra

By Paul Pickering
RYAN Bastinac has arrived at the dawn of a new era for North Melbourne and he wants to play a big part in the Roo revival.
The Narre Warren teenager was selected at pick 21 in Thursday night’s draft and immediately embraced as a perfect fit for the new-breed Roos.
Bastinac, 18, barely had time to slip on his new club jumper before North skipper Brent Harvey called to welcome and congratulate him.
North Melbourne chose Bastinac – an inside midfielder with equal parts class and courage – and Geelong hard-nut Ben Cunnington (pick five) with its first two selections in the draft, further flagging its intention to toughen up under new coach Brad Scott.
And that mantra sits pretty comfortably with Bastinac, whose willingness to win his own footy is beyond question.
“(Scott) just wants the players to be really competitive and clean, and the decision-making to be clean as well, and they’re my strengths, so hopefully I can fit in well,” he said.
“I’m just rapt that it’s happened. When my name got called out it was a huge relief.”
A relief too for Roos’ talent identification manager Bryce Lewis, who later revealed that he had his sights set on Bastinac from a long way out.
The Roos wasted little time in ushering Bastinac into his new reality. He moved in with his host family in Pascoe Vale on Sunday and inspected the new Arden Street training facility with his new team-mates on Monday.
His timing, it seems, could hardly have been better.
“A few of the boys have been giving us a bit of stick, because they’ve had to deal with the old facility for ages and we just walk straight into the new $15 million facility – so we’re pretty lucky,” he laughed on Tuesday night.
Luck has had little to do with Bastinac’s path to the AFL. Many at the Stingrays have likened his work ethic to that of 2009 co-captain Tom Scully.
In fact, the two families have an interesting footy history, given that Ryan’s dad, Peter, played alongside Tom’s dad, Phil, with Dandenong’s VFA side in the early ’80s.
The father-and-son duos met again as junior footy rivals with Narre Warren and Berwick, the dads coaching respective sides, before Tom moved across to join Ryan during their teenage years.
Bastinac Snr, who was an assistant coach at the Rays this year, couldn’t have been more proud of his son on Thursday night.
“It’s fantastic,” he said.
“He’s been really lucky to be involved in a great program at the Stingrays under (coach) Graeme Yeats and (region manager) Darren Flanigan and I’m lucky to be a part of it and watch him develop.
“From an early age, he was just doing little things on the footy field that made you think, ‘yeah, he might go on (to play in the AFL)’.”
Bastinac recently graduated from the Hallam Senior College AFL program, which draws on the expertise of Flanigan and AFL director Ben McGee.
The program, which also produced 2008 draftees Tom Gillies and Shane Savage, provides budding footballers with the opportunity to learn about their sporting trade without abandoning the regular curriculum.
Bastinac captained the AFL program and co-ordinated regular coaching clinics at nearby schools, including his own Maramba Primary School in Narre Warren.
And those skills are sure to come in handy as he embarks on the next phase of his footy life.