Blue and Golds’ proud history of inter-league footy
Inter-league footy and netball has long been a core element of winter sports seasons in regional and country areas.
Of course, the spread of the Covid pandemic ruled out any contests throughout 2020 and 2021 and as I write this the 2023 inter-league fixture date has yet to be decided.
So 2019 was the last season Bendigo teams could participate.
And what a great day it turned out to be for the Blue and Golds.
The senior Bendigo footy team thrashed the Outer East metropolitan side by 99 points.
Yep, just one point short of a three-figure margin.
I recall sitting in the QEO grandstand watching the absolute slaughter of the almost-suburban city league and taking notes as well as thinking it’s good to get a win, but wouldn’t a more competitive game be better.
Probably a fair few of the spectators sitting in the historic stand felt the same. But then again a win is a win especially when it’s an inter-league outing.
South coach Nathan Horbury played on a half-back flank and was a rebounding ace, Square teammates Jake Thrum and Jack Geary were unstoppable collecting possessions all over midfield and up forward while then-Storm key position player Bryce Curnow collected a heap of possessions and marks.
And Castlemaine mid Jake O’Brien enjoyed his first win for that 2019 season so it was a big day for him.
Bendigo ……..4.4…..10.10….12.15 18.17 (125)
Outer East…..0.3…… 1.4……..1.7………..3.8 (26)
BFNL goals: Jack Scanlon 3, Jack Geary 2, Alex Marklew 2, Jake O’Brien 2, Lachlan Sharp 2, Jayden Burke, Matt Goodyear, Josh Govan, Pat McKenna, Jake Thrum, Ben McPhee, Hugh Robertson.
Best: Jake Thrum (Derrick Filo medal), Jack Geary, Nathan Horbury, Bryce Curnow, Liam Barrett, Pat McKenna.
The senior squad was: Jake O’Brien (Cm), Brodie Collins, Ben McPhee (Eh) Matt Goodyear, Pat McKenna, Jack Scanlon (Gis), Adam Baird, Liam Barrett, Jayden Burke, Jack Geary (capt.), Alex Marklew, Jake Thrum (GS), Josh Govan, Harrison Huntley, Rhys Magin (Kyn), Callum Crisp, Nathan Horbury (SB), Jake Pallpratt (Sh), Bryce Curnow, Harry Crone, Sam Heavyside, Bailey Henderson, Hugh Robertson, Lachlan Sharp (Storm).
Coach: Darryl Wilson. Asst. coaches: Rick Ladson, Stephen Milne, Simon Rosa, Damian Slater.
Manager: Mick Farrell.
Three seasons earlier, in May 2016, the BFNL Blue and Golds celebrated an eight-goal win over Gippsland at Warragul’s Western Park.
It was the fourth win-in-a-row for Bendigo over Gippsland following a nine-point win in 2010, a 23-point success in 2012 and victory by 34 points in 2014: all at the QEO.
Coach Brett Fitzpatrick was in a re-building frame of mind in 2016 following the BFNL’s 77-point thrashing by Ballarat the year prior: in 2015.
Final scores eight years back: Ballarat 17.11 (113) def. Bendigo 4.12 (36). But the Central Vic women beat Northern Country 6.3 (39) to 3.8 (26).
So in 2016 Fitzpatrick went for a side with 12 new players and plenty of youth.
He said the Blue and Gold’s focus would be on bringing the ball to ground and moving it quickly.
“We didn’t know what we were going to come up against so we focussed on an optimistic angle.
“But that focus had to be brought about by hard running and defensive tackling from our forward six, so that Gippsland’s disposal would be more frustrated than clean.
“I thought that plan was carried out well throughout the game,” the Blue and Golds’ coach said.
Bendigo led from start to finish with seven players booting two or more majors.
Bendigo captain and Vic Country representative Jack Geary helped break the game open in the second half while Strathfieldsaye’s Trent Donnan was the ultimate winner of Bendigo’s Derrick Filo medal for best afield.
Donnan was no stranger to medal-winning. He’d twice won the Mallee F.L.’s fairest and best award before joining the Storm.
It was Bendigo’s fourth win in as many outings against Gippsland and achieved without the services of Sandhurst’s Michelsen medallist Kristan Height for the second half.
Height was sidelined with a hamstring strain which was expected to keep him out of the Sandhurst side for at least a week.
The rival full-forwards had days out. Gippsland’s Chris Dunne (Leongatha) nailed five goals while the BFNL’s Dylan Johnstone (Golden Square) booted four.
Final scores: BFNL 17.18 (110) def. Gippsland 12.7 (79).
But it hasn’t always been a success story for every BFNL Blue and Gold outfit.
Back in 2007 on the QEO Ballarat scored close to a four-goal win over the Bendigo home side.
Final scores: Ballarat 12.15 (87) def. Bendigo 9.10 (64). Yet in the under-18 curtain-raiser Bendigo came out on top: 9.10 (64) to Ballarat’s 4.11 (35).
And a few years even further back, after success in Division 2 in 2002, the promoted Blue and Golds were thumped in 2003 by Geelong F.L. in the top grade.
Scores: Geelong 18.7 (115) def. Bendigo 8.3 (51).
Harking back to that 2002 inter-league campaign and Bendigo scored two wins: over Central Murray and Bellarine.
Final siren tallies – Bendigo 11.9 (75) to Central Murray’s 9.8 (62) and then 27.25 (187) to Bellarine’s 8.5 (53).
Neville Strauch remains as the best known inter-league coach of reasonably recent seasons.
Yes, I know we’re re-winding back to the late 1980s, but those of us with long memories remember Nev’s strong work ethic and a ‘take no nonsense’ approach.
He’d been a formidable backman in Golden Square’s run of successes in the mid-Sixties after starting his under-18 career by riding his pushbike from Huntly to training at Wade Street and to matches on Saturdays.
How tired and puffed he much have been pedalling a bicycle from Huntly through Epsom and White Hills, across town and out to Wade Street. We can only guess!
Harking back to those earlier years for Strauchie and he’d won the BFL under-18 fairest and best award in 1957, the same season he made his senior debut under coach Alan Martin.
At 185 cm (6 ft. 1 inch) he was mainly used across the half-back line graduating to Square’s senior CHB quite a few seasons before the Bulldogs’ 1964 senior premiership.
Scores: Golden Square 10.10 (70) def. Rochester 9.7 (61).
Neville ended up playing 217 games in 13 seasons (1956—1968), and was a BFL inter-league representative in five campaigns.
As the BFL senior inter-league coach Strauchie was in charge from 1988 to 1990.
In his first year in the top job the Blue and Golds downed old rival Goulburn Valley in Round 2 --- and over in Shepparton, if you don’t mind.
Starting with a 27-point win over Western Border in Rd. 1, the Blue and Golds scored a stunning 57-point victory over Goulburn Valley next up in a semi-final.
But as I’ve written about in these columns before Bendigo went down to the Geelong F.L. at the East Geelong oval in the 1988 decider.
The result was reversed the following season when the Brendan Hartney-led Bendigo downed Geelong in the VCFL grand final to hand ‘Strauchie’ his most significant success as the BFL’s inter-league maestro.
