Source :- PERTH NOW NEWS
September is usually like Christmas for the footy-mad Daniher household.
But this weekend, the well-respected AFL family will shoulder the unimaginable grief of losing patriarch, Australian rules great and former Australian of the Year, Neale Daniher.
The former Essendon player and Melbourne coach lost his battle with motor neurone disease (MND) in May, just weeks out from Big Freeze 12 – a hugely successful charity spectacle Mr Daniher built alongside his daughter Bec over more than a decade.
“It’s still very raw. It is going to be a tough weekend, but I think it’s moments like these that you reflect back on everything that he’s given me as a dad,” Ms Daniher told AAP.
“I heard once that grief is the price that we pay for love, and so I’m feeling a lot of grief, but that’s because I had so much love for him.
“This weekend will be a moment to just reflect on that, and also to celebrate the other dads in our lives.”
Among those father figures is Ms Daniher’s husband, Drew, who will celebrate his first Father’s Day as a dad of three following the arrival of Ted Neale Daniher two months ago.
“(Ted’s middle name) was just a small way to honour dad and everything that he’s done for us,” Ms Daniher said.
“If Ted can grow up and hear about his pop and have traits of poppy, we’ll be so proud.”
Baby Ted was among a crowd of more than 150 who gathered in Melbourne on Friday for Like Father, Like Daughter, a luncheon hosted by female sports leadership organisation Play Like A Girl Australia.
Famous father-daughter sporting duos Tim and Sam Lane led the Father’s Day event at the Pullman Hotel in East Melbourne alongside guest speakers Ms Daniher and Greg and Erin Phillips.
Phillips’ induction into the Australian Football Hall of Fame in June 2025, five years after Greg, made the pair the first father-daughter duo to share the accolade.
Celebrating the influence of fathers and allies in empowering women and girls through sport, the luncheon spotlighted Ms Daniher’s journey with Fight MND, co-founded by Daniher following his 2013 diagnosis with the terminal disease.
Ms Daniher immediately left her accounting job and elite rowing career to become the organisation’s first employee.
Today, she sits at the helm as the not-for-profit’s executive director, where she has helped raise more than $157 million for MND research and care.
“I’m hoping one day we get to close our doors because we don’t need to exist anymore at Fight MND,” she told AAP.
“We set out on this journey knowing that it wouldn’t help dad, which was very hard, and we’ve seen that come to life.
“But it’s always been about who will come after … that’s why we need to continue to fight.”
