AUSTIN Wonaeamirri will board a plane on Thursday and fly to the Tiwi Islands for three days. He returns a man, not the boy who left seven weeks ago. Then, he was a kid with a dream and a thin rookie's chance of success. Today, he returns an AFL player and matchwinner.

If satisfaction did not come in victory alone for Melbourne, recording not only its first win of the season but overturning one of the biggest leads in its history, then it came in the form of Austin Wonaeamirri.

He kicked four goals — three in the final quarter, including one to put his side in front. When his team needed a player to win the match, he was there. He was not alone, for the Demons were folding over Fremantle in waves, but they needed a player to turn those opportunities into scores and he — like Russell Robertson — did it. Robertson, of course, has done it before. Not Wonaeamirri.

It was he who ran on to the loose ball from Matthew Bate's long kick to goal early in the last. It was he who capped off Brad Miller's bump and the Demons' forward defensive pressure to goal later in the term and he again who crumbed Robertson's marking attempt late in the quarter to kick the goal to put his side ahead. He then pumped his fist and turned and gyrated in unbridled excitement.

"I just ran back and kicked it. I didn't realise that I put us in front. I just looked up at the scoreboard and saw we were in front," he smiled. "I just wanted to get us going. I kicked it, did the celebration, looked up at the scoreboard and thought: 'Listen, bad celebration.'

"I don't know what to say. We were down by 50 points at half-time. We went into the room and Bails (coach Dean Bailey) gave us a spray and said we are still in it, we can still win. Then we just stuck together, we said: 'We can't let Freo run away with the match; we are going to come out firing in the third quarter.' We just came at them. The same thing happened in the last quarter. We decided the game was not over and we are here to win.

"During this week, the leadership group said we have got to come to the game with a winning attitude. We have got a win before the break now."

He returns home on Thursday, expecting a big welcome.

"The game was televised live. Mate, I reckon I will be having everyone at my house the night I arrive there," he laughed.

"I'll just do a some fishing, hunting turtle, catching up with mates, walking around the community, talking to everyone, kicking the footy with mates. That is about it," he said. "Bails said to me they are going to trust me to watch what I eat. Turtles have a lot of fat in them, so I am going to cut out turtle, I think.

"The last time I have been home was when we had the week off before round one. I'm excited to go home and see my stepmum (Rosabelle) and Dad (Matthew) and everyone."