The traditional Melbourne AFL season opener sees Richmond host Carlton at the MCG on Thursday night.
Best Bet
This is an enormous Round 1 line, but Richmond looks set for a historically bad season in 2025.
The Tigers have lost an unprecedented amount of experience in the off-season, dropping from the fourth-oldest list in 2024 to the second-youngest in 2025. They will debut at least three players in this game and will be forced to field several others who just wouldn’t get a game at any other club to cover the void left by Martin, Bolton, Rioli, Baker, Grimes, Graham, etc.
Adem Yze’s side was awful in the pre-season too, managing just 26 points against West Coast before being demolished by 83 points against Collingwood.
Carlton will be without Charlie Curnow but has shown a knack for dominating weaker sides under Michael Voss, covering in four of five games when favoured by 30+ points, with an average winning margin of 67 points.
Only one of the last seven 40+ point underdogs in the opening three rounds of the season has covered the line, and it’s hard to see Richmond getting close to Carlton on Thursday night.
Same Game Multi
Cerra looked good in Carlton’s final pre-season match against GWS, racking up 21 touches in only 57% game time.
Brodie Kemp will be the Blues’s second forward option here and kicked three against the Giants. Orazio is a nice price to boost the multi too after kicking a goal in each of his last four games last year.
Value Bet
This will likely be the first and last time we back Orazio in 2025 but he kicked four against the Tiges in Round 16 last year and he’ll get plenty of opportunities to hit the scoreboard in this one.
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