AT THE CONCLUSION of round three, I knew I would be facing up to one of my brothers for the first time this season.

As we were playing Richmond, it would be Mitchell that I would be confronting out on the field.

Not only was it a big week for us, it was a huge week for our respective teams – particularly with the first win of the season on the line for both of us.

Mitch and I were playing for a lot of pride and bragging rights were on the line.

My focus quickly turned onto my training. I trained hard all week in the lead-up. I knew I had to go into the match thinking it was just another team, so I could perform my role.

During the match, I spoiled Mitch a couple times. Another moment, Mitch tried to break past me when I was on the mark, but he was unsuccessful. After the match, I said 'well done' to Mitch and then waited a few hours afterwards before I spoke to him properly. Then we were brothers again.

And as it turned out, we were fortunate to get the four points. Unfortunately for Mitch, it didn't work out that way. It was good to get the wood over my brother early in the season – I know I've got something to remind him with until we meet again in round 18.

It's always hard playing against your brother, because you want him to do well, but obviously not his team. So it was tough to be honest.

Whenever Mitch, Jarryd or I play against each other, we see each other as opponents not brothers, and even in the week leading up the match, we don't talk about each other's clubs. It's almost an unwritten rule.

We did some media together in the lead-up. A journalist came over to Mitch's place and we did an interview together.

It really struck me how our relationship had built so much through the AFL.

We bounce a lot of things off each other and learn a lot from one another as well. As I've developed as a player, I've noticed the importance of having Mitch and Jarryd in Victoria as well.

We're still developing as a team, but our leaders and senior players can only do so much each week. From there, our younger players will follow.

Although it took until round four to have a full team contribution, it showed on the scoreboard. Our second quarter, especially, was some of the best footy I've seen in my time at Melbourne. That's the type of footy we'll be striving to play for the rest of 2009.

It was just the third win I had played in at Melbourne, so the feeling afterwards was fantastic. We're really trying to savour every win.

Dean Bailey has shown a lot of faith in us, particularly the younger guys. He's prepared to play us and it was great to repay him a little bit.

And if we're going to become a powerhouse of the competition, which is what we want to become, we need to win games of footy and play an exciting brand to bring fans to the game.

We believe we demonstrated some of that on the weekend and, if we can produce that consistently, we will bring excitement to the footy club.