MEL Hickey says it’s been a “mad” but fantastic first week since she officially joined teammate Daisy Pearce as one of Melbourne’s two marquee players in the lead-up to the inaugural women’s football league next year.

Hickey, an outstanding defender, said she was thrilled to find out that she was a pioneering member of Melbourne’s team for 2017 – even though she has represented the red and blue in AFL exhibition matches since 2013. 

“It’s been a bit mad, especially last week. This week has settled down a little bit. There have been lots of media and friends and family texting their congratulations,” she told Melbourne TV.

“There has been some messages and on Twitter saying ‘we’re glad to have you at the club and we’re happy with the choices’, so that’s always nice.

“I even got to do my first official club appearance, when we went down to the Parkville Youth Justice Centre with some of the boys, so that was really interesting last week.

“I’m still a little bit on cloud nine and the surreal feelings are starting to become a bit more real now, so it’s been awesome.”

Hickey, who is related to Pat Hickey (a dual Fitzroy premiership player in 1898-99) and Reg Hickey (captain of Geelong’s Team of the Century), said she caught up with her parents soon after she found out her news to celebrate with them.

“My folks were down from Mildura last week and I got to have dinner with them and it was a really nice moment to sit back and we talked about when I was a kid and kicked the footy around,” she said.

“I was just able to thank them for all of their support as well, so it was quite a nice moment to do some reflection.”

Hickey said she and Peace were already looking to make a big impact with Melbourne in the new competition next year.

“The morning of the announcement, we had a coffee together and [we’re] really starting to look towards the future and building now,” she said.

“We’re talking about who we want to draft next and build our list, and talking about coaches and the strategies, so we’re already talking about getting the best side together, so we can win next year.

“We’re still in our state league, so we’ve got three rounds left of that. Hopefully we’ll go well into the finals, so that’s still our main focus.

“In October, we’ll have the draft and we’ll get 23 other teammates … and then we start pre-season training in November. Then we get into the really hard work then.”