CHRISTIAN Salem, who will make his AFL debut against the Sydney Swans at the MCG on Saturday night, says it will also be somewhat of a new experience, as he has rarely played a night match in his football career.

Salem, who was Melbourne’s first selection in last year’s NAB AFL Draft (No.9 overall), said it was a bit surreal when he was told by coach Paul Roos that he would play his first match for the Demons this round.

“I haven’t played too many night games – I’ve only played about two, so it’ll be pretty interesting,” he told Dee TV.

“I’m pretty calm when it comes to games, but I’ll be pretty nervous, so we’ll see what happens and hopefully it’ll be a good day.

“It hasn’t really sunk in yet. Roosy came up to me at the end of training and said ‘do you want to play?’ I said ‘why not’. He told the boys just after that and I was really, really happy.”

Salem starred for Casey against Frankston at Frankston Oval last Sunday, winning 32 disposals, which helped secure his place in the Melbourne line-up this week.

“During the game, you don’t really take it in consideration [that you want to] play for Melbourne, but you just want to do your best for Casey and try and get the result and in the end, we ended up beating Frankston,” he said.

“[Development coaches] Brad Miller and ‘Fruity’ (Brett Allison) said before the game that ‘if you play together, you’re the ones who get yourselves in the [Melbourne] team’.

“So we worked together and it was a good team performance.”