Bigger than Jebus

Ladies calm thyself; there's a giant picture of Colin Sylvia on the Melbourne OS. Fear not though, hetrosexual males, there's something for us as well - the great man is BACK. Unseen since his VFA* Grand Final massacre, "The Future" has shaken off injury and is threatening to run riot throughout the regular season. Get on the bandwagon now.

Melbourne has included the highly-regarded Colin Sylvia and developing defender Nathan Carroll in a 28-man squad ahead of its Wizard Home Loans Cup quarter final against Carlton this Sunday.

Sylvia, the No.3 pick of the 2003 National draft, has played just three senior matches after being injured several times last year. He is able to play in this match despite serving a one-match suspension arising from last year's VFL grand final. Although the Demons are fighting this ruling, he will miss the season-opener against Essendon.

The injured Jared Rivers (hand) and Cameron Hunter are out of the Demon squad.

Carroll was a likely inclusion this week given the injury suffered by Rivers during Melbourne's defeat of Brisbane in Cairns last week.

It's expected Carroll, Clint Bizzell and Ryan Ferguson will be charged with quietening Carlton's Lance Whitnall and Brendan Fevola.

The Blues meanwhile, have included Glen Bowyer and Setanta O'hAilpin in their squad, after losing Scott Camporeale to a suspension and Digby Morrell to an ankle injury.

Irishman O'hAilpin played one match in the pre-season competition last year, but is yet to make his senior debut. Morrell was cut from Carlton's squad last week before the side took on Essendon.

Squad: Chris Heffernan, Clint Bizzell, Brock McLean, Matthew Bate, Brad Miller, David Neitz, Paul Johnson, Colin Sylvia, Adem Yze, Lynden Dunn, Travis Johnstone, Brad Green, Daniel Bell, Brent Moloney, James McDonald, Russell Robertson, Nathan Brown, Luke Williams, Simon Godfrey, Paul Wheatley, Cameron Bruce, Jeff White, Ryan Ferguson, Aaron Davey, Mark Jamar, Nathan Carroll, Guy Rigoni, Matthew Whelan

Sunday predicts a Melbourne win by 21 points. Don't excited - we're not in the habit of being optimistic and it almost certainly won't extend into the Home and Away season but let's be entirely serious here. We're playing Carlton. Carlton are shit. We are marginally better than shit. Therefore we should win. Damn the good year/bad year theory - I'm officially declaring it dead. More on that later.

Apparently there's a reserves game on at Optus Oval at 10am Saturday. Should I completely lose all reason to live and find myself at a loose end I might show up, stand on the terraces, take pictures of the empty stands and attempt a report.

* Be warned that the VFL, Kangaroos and Western Bulldogs don't exist on this website. They will be known exclusively as the VFA, North Melbourne and Footscray.