Son of a Legend Begins Own Royal Journey

HE was named after an East Perth premiership hero, his dad is a Royals all-time great and Devan Wulff is now beginning his own footballing journey in the No. 13 jumper in black-and-blue.

The now 18-year-old might have had Royal blood growing up watching his dad Craig go on to put together a legendary career which sees him as the East Perth games record holder, and was named after triple premiership winning hard man Devan Perry.

However, Craig never pushed his son Devan to play football or to even play at East Perth unless he truly wanted to, and he couldn’t be happier to see his journey now beginning in the Royals colts.

Devan has played the last five games of this season now in the colts at East Perth to begin a similar path to his father at the start of the century with Craig playing 38 colts and 31 reserves matches before embarking on a remarkable 286-game WAFL career with the Royals.

Watching son now play with Royals

Wulff finds he might be even more nervous watching his son play than he was in his own playing days that included two Grand Final appearances as captain, two State game appearances including one as captain, and being an FD Book Medal winner.

"It's really exciting to be honest," Craig said.

"It's nearly as exciting as playing yourself, but it is probably a lot more stressful than I actually thought it would be. Obviously you want to see him do well and it can be quite stressful sitting back watching."

Decision to play with Royals

While Wulff himself came to East Perth from Thornlie and then his son Devan played junior football at Canning Vale where Craig still coaches younger son Jai, there was never any question from any of them that it would be with the Royals that he would play should he want to pursue playing WAFL.

"Obviously you're happy with whatever your kids want to do, but he really enjoys his footy," Craig said.

"I was rapt that he did want to play footy for starters and then to get into East Perth under the father-son role is super exciting.

"It would have been very hard to watch him run around in other colours and we do live in the East Fremantle zone. His friends play at East Fremantle but he's at East Perth and I wouldn’t want to see him play anywhere else."

Despite living in East Fremantle's zone, Devan was eligible to play at East Perth as will younger brother Jai when the time comes under the father-son rule and nobody in the family ever considered him playing anywhere but at the Royals.

"I never think it crossed my mind and I don't think it ever crossed his mind to not play at East Perth," Craig said.

"I'd obviously told him many years ago that he could play at East Perth under the father-son rule so it never even crossed our minds that he would play anywhere else."

Dream of watching son play at Royals

When Devan first came into the world, Craig did initially dream of seeing his son play with East Perth one day and to see him not only carry on the Wulff name but also the Devan first name was everything he hoped might eventuate.

At the same time, he was never going to push his son in that direction, he was going to be allowed to follow whatever path he wanted. That makes his dad all the more proud that he did want to pursue playing WAFL with East Perth having grown up around the Royals.

"I suppose he would have been taking little bits in here and there as he got that bit older in the last few years of my career, but I think he just enjoyed his junior footy and with me being around him and mentoring him, it did push him that direction a little bit," he said.

"But I couldn’t tell you whether it was his full on dream or not to play at East Perth, and time will tell whether or not he puts in the amount of effort it would require to become a league player down the track."

Still a long way to go

Just because he is the son of the club's games record holder, Craig is fully aware that Devan won't have anything handed to him at the Royals and nor would he ever want him to.

Having had to bide his time himself to bang down the door for his league opportunity after playing more than 30 reserves matches on top of two years at colts, Craig knows that Devan has a lot of work to do as a current colts player to see if he wants to pursue WAFL beyond his teen years.

"I played two full years of colts and a year and-a-half of reserves before I even got an opportunity, which I think in these days might still be required," Craig said.

"To get there any earlier I think you need to be super exceptional these days and the competition is so strong, and you need to be a pretty mature body to play senior footy. That's the hardest part for the 18, 19 or 20 year olds now to be ready for that."

Connection still with Devan Perry

Craig grew up idolising Devan Perry and the way he went about his football during his 128-game career that including being part of the 2000, 2001 and 2002 premierships.

It's a nice twist of fate now that while Craig's son his beginning his colts journey, Devan's daughter Kiahn joined East Perth in 2024 and played three WAFLW matches.

"We talk whenever we cross paths and I've made mention to my son about the way Devan Perry played his footy, and to try to follow on in whatever way he can," Craig said.

"But Devan obviously watches footy closely and his daughter is also at East Perth playing in the league team too so he's not too far away and I'm sure he keeps a very close eye on it."

Reflecting on own playing career

Wulff was never one to reflect on what he had achieved while still playing, but now that he has been retired since 2016 he does have a chance to reflect and he is rightfully proud of what he achieved.

There were different parts to Wulff's career too as his early years saw him play as a tenacious half-back flanker before he then graduated to the wing and he made that position his own for a number of years as the hardest runner in the competition racking up enormous amounts of the ball.

He then spent the latter part of his career as an inside midfielder too where his toughness and contested ball winning ability along with tenacious tackling was able to shine.

Along the way, he won an FD Book Medal in 2010 while having eight top five finishes to go with being runner-up four times showing his remarkable consistency over a 286-game career that saw him surpass the 269 games of Derek Chadwick along the way.

Wulff was also a long-time captain of the Royals and then got two State appearances late in his career including being captain in 2012.

There's a lot to be proud of, but he also can't help but think of what else might have been too.

"Some days you look back and think about if you could have done more or not in those quiet times when you reflect," Wulff said.

"You see big moments in games that you're watching and you do wonder whether there was more you could have done, and that sometimes still haunts you a little bit, but I think all in all I got the most out of myself.

"I don't think that by the time I finished I had anything left, I was absolutely spent. To have played that amount of games at WAFL level I think is something that's quite special and it's not easy to work for yourself and then train as hard as what they do at AFL level but just in a smaller amount of time.

"It really wasn’t easy and then having my young family, I needed a lot of support at home with my wife and our families to be able to comes home late on weeknights, and miss dinner and the kids going to bed. I did thoroughly enjoy my football and I definitely would do it all again, that's for sure."

Missing premiership something you never get over

Wulff started his playing days at East Perth watching on as the Royals won the hat-trick of premierships of 2000, 2001 and 2002, and he had every reason to expect if he was able to break into the league team, that he would be part of similar success in his career.

However, the fact it didn’t happen is something that Wulff still thinks about to this day and he never got the chance to play in a Grand Final until 2013 when he was already 225 games into his career.

The Royals played in the 2013 and 2014 Grand Finals with Wulff the captain in both those games, and while those losses to West Perth and Subiaco are still tough to stomach, what he wishes more was a chance earlier in his career.

"I wished I had those Grand Final opportunities more when I was in my prime years rather than near the end," Wulff said.

"You wonder if you could have done a bit more to achieve that success if I was still in the prime of my footy career. You do wonder some days if things could have been just a little bit different."

Where he's at in 2024

Wulff right now is still coaching son Jai at Canning Vale and while he doesn’t have an official role with East Perth, he is there early watching the colts and is casting a keen eye over the league team of 2024.

As someone who gave an enormous amount blood, sweat and tears trying to help the Royals win that first premiership since 2002, he has high hopes that 2024 could be the time.

I just help out with my middle son with his junior football and then obviously follow what Dev is doing at East Perth, and keep a very close eye on him. Jai is playing at Canning Vale where I'm coaching him.

"I think on their day I truly believe they are the best team in it this year when they are at their best," Wulff said.

"Their form the last few weeks hasn’t quite been as good as it has been, but I still think from what I've seen their best footy is as good, if not better, than everybody else's.

"That can depend on Peel and their Fremantle numbers come finals time, but I do think they are in for a very big chance. There's still a tremendous amount of upside in their team."

While Wulff would be as happy as anybody to see East Perth win a premiership again in 2024, he looks at the long-term servants of the club right from president Bronte Howson down who deserve to get to celebrate for the years and years of effort and dedication.

"The whole board has been through so much for a long time and even from when I was playing, then I finished and have moved on, and a lot of them are still there with Bronte, Dean Turner and there's a lot of old support staff and volunteers that are all still there," he said.

"They are still there a long time after me so I would just as rapt for all those people to be part of a premiership as I would be for myself and the current players."