It would be fair to say Luke Davies-Uniacke has well and truly arrived on the AFL scene.

After breaking his career-high disposal count with 28 touches in Round 19 against Carlton, he once again upped his output to demolish that number, registering 38 disposals in Round 21 against Richmond.

The breakout of the young North Melbourne star has been a long time coming, with his 24 disposal, 11 clearance effort against Hawthorn in Round 9 a true indicator of his enormous potential.

While young careers often take off in fits and starts, Davies-Uniacke’s growth on the field looks to have been a relatively smooth transition, with the fourth-year player gaining confidence with each passing game.

“It’s great. It’s good to smash that old one (career-high disposal count) out the park which is nice. I just want to keep building my game.” Davies-Uniacke told North Media.

“I just want to keep growing my game and keep doing the basics well.

“Gaining that confidence is a real key … the coaches have given me a couple of licences and I’m just trying to add to my game each week.”

While there are plenty of positives to take out of Saturday’s loss to Richmond, the manner in which North suffered defeat was still frustrating to the playing group. 

Taking control of the game in the first term, the Kangaroos couldn’t kick away from Richmond when momentum was on their side, and ended up on the wrong side of a 53-point turnaround.

Richmond went on to win the clash by 33 points, but Davies-Uniacke says there are more positives to be taken out of the defeat than negatives.

“Us as a playing group were really pleased with the first half. We were all over the Tigers but unfortunately we couldn’t put the four quarters in,” he said.

“‘Nobes’ saw it as a great opportunity to learn against the best, and he really nailed that down with us after the game.

“We’ve picked apart what we need to improve on. There are always good signs of us trying to do our best, and the effort is there,”

With just two home-and-away clashes left for the season, North’s 2021 campaign is slowly coming to an end.

The final two clashes will offer young players the chance to step up and create a strong launching pad to kickstart the 2022 season.

With the likes of midfield lynchpin Ben Cunnington currently unavailable, Davies-Uniacke says the whole midfield is trying to step up in his absence.

“We miss ‘Cunners’ out there, he’s obviously our main, stable guy,” he said.

“We’re trying to do him proud at the minute, and the rest of the fans proud.

“We want to keep striving to get those wins, that’s the man goal because we’re all competitors … it’s exciting times for the lads.