Allen Jakovich - VFL/AFL Career

VFL/AFL Career

He debuted in the seniors in round 1 against the West Coast Eagles at Subiaco but was quickly dropped for the following week. Jakovich played in the Melbourne reserves and dominated the reserves competition in the first half of the 1991 season.

In the second half, though, he burst out convincingly and big hauls came on an almost weekly basis for the rest of the season making a big impression in the league with his confident playing style. A high point was a near single handed defeat of North Melbourne where he kicked 11 goals (including a miraculous scissor kick out of mid-air from twenty metres out, a certain goal of the year candidate), 8 behinds and one out on the full. This effort also earned Jakovich the distinction of being the fastest player to score his first fifty goals, taking only nine games to do so. He finished with 71 goals for his debut season; becoming one of a handful of players in VFL/AFL history to kick 50 goals in both the senior competition and now defunct 'reserves' league within the same season. He kicked his 100th career goal in his 21st game, equalling the record held by John Coleman.

Over the next three years at Melbourne he balanced some mercurial performances with fitness problems and indifferent form. He was let go at the end of the 1994 season, due to persistent hamstring injuries. He spent the next year out of the game before being drafted by the Footscray Football Club for an ill-fated comeback that lasted barely half a season. In his AFL career, kicked 208 goals, 173 behinds.

He kissed his brother Glen during a match between Melbourne and the West Coast Eagles at the MCG.