SO JAMES Hird's potential comeback to AFL football is over before it began. The former Essendon champion was yesterday quick to scotch this newspaper's report that he was considering a return to the game in 2009.

It had seemed an amazing prospect, given a year out of the game and the fact he will turn 36 before next season.

But it was clearly one that many senior people at Windy Hill thought far more than the stuff of fantasy, particularly those who had played alongside him.

When Hird spoke to former teammates on holiday in Las Vegas recently about how he would love to be playing, the impact was profound.

So much so that skipper Matthew Lloyd told radio last weekend that he had changed his mind about retirement, having heeded Hird's advice to play as long as he possibly could.

Other Bombers who figured in the discussions noted Hird's longing to still be able to play at the elite level, and were more impressed with his physical condition than he apparently was, claiming he was "flying".

The excitement around the playing ranks at the very thought of a Hird return was palpable, and for some, hard to contain, hence the reports filtering back to The Age.

They were reports which, in ordinary circumstances, would be run directly by the person in question. Except that, in this case, the subject of the reports happened to be a contributor to this newspaper's major opposition.

A complication Hird said he understood when he spoke to The Age yesterday to explain his situation. The Essendon legend said he might have said something during the US trip that people around the club had got a little too excited about.

Until yesterday, anyway, when the officialdom at Windy Hill played a very straight bat to the idea.

"There is no response from within the club. As far as I'm aware Matthew Knights hadn't spoken to James," said chief executive Peter Jackson.

"I saw it when I read the front page of The Age, and all I know is that later on apparently he got on radio, which I didn't hear, and said it isn't true. That's the sum of my knowledge on the matter."

A Hird comeback would certainly have flown in the face of the youth policy the club has embarked upon under Knights' coaching.

The lure for the Dons, however, would have been the priceless on-field leadership Hird would have been able to provide to a young playing list.

It had worked when Tim Watson returned 15 years ago, and again, to a lesser extent, when Paul Salmon came back to the club after five seasons with Hawthorn followed by a year's break, in 2002.

Not all such comebacks are good stories, the legacy built by Tony Lockett with St Kilda then Sydney fortunately more than large enough to withstand a forgettable re-emergence with the Swans the same year Salmon returned to the Dons.

Hird, however, having won a best-and-fairest in his final year, at 34, still fit and able, is one man who could have defied the law of football ageing.

The prospect of which was enough to set Windy Hill tongues flapping. When a champion like Hird even hints at the word comeback, people are very ready to listen.