Can Ruby, Gabe or someone else break the Betty Thompson goaler curse
BY KIERAN ILES
BENDIGO TIMES
IS THIS the year the historical dominance of the BFNL’s Betty Thompson Medal by midcourters and defenders ends?
Only time will tell as the league prepares to honour its fairest and best A-grade netballer this Sunday night at its annual awards night at the Bendigo Club.
Amid a quality crop of class midcourters, led by Kangaroo Flat’s two-time winner Chelsea Sartori, her Roos teammate Ash Ryan and Sandhurst’s young gun Shae Clifford, and brilliant defenders, Kangaroo Flat’s former Melbourne Vixens sharpshooter Ruby Barkmeyer and South Bendigo powerhouse Gabe Richards will start among the favourites.
But history will be against Barkmeyer and Richards, and the likes of Sandhurst’s four-time premiership star Bec Smith (the only goaler in the top 10 of last year’s voting) and young guns Torie Skrijel (Gisborne), Chloe Langley (Eaglehawk) and Mia McCrann-Peters (Golden Square), all proven vote getters in this and other competitions.
It has been 19 years since a permanent goal shooter last won the BFNL’s top individual netball award.
The last one was Kangaroo Flat’s Joanne Brown, who won the medal in 2006.
Back-to-back wins in 2023 and ’24 by Sartori continued a long tradition of midcourters claiming the prize.
Only Maryborough’s Krystal Doherty (2008 joint winner) and Alisha Chadwick (2010), Meg Gilbert (2014 joint winner), and two-time winners Heather Oliver (2015 and ’17) and Maddy Stewart (2018 and ’22) have bucked that trend as defenders since Brown’s triumph.
Far more surprisingly, the honour roll includes very few goalers across the league’s 35-year history.
It’s perhaps ironic that the first recipient of the league’s best and fairest award, Northern United’s Irene Kline, who won it when it was called the Fulton Medal (it was renamed the Betty Thompson Medal in 1997), was a goal shooter.
But in a sign of things to come, seven of the next nine medal counts were won by midcourters, including dual winners Carol Sing and Rose Gallagher (nee Walgers).
Sandhurst’s Kay Walsh (1996) and Eaglehawk’s Genevieve Slater (1998) flew the flag for the defenders during the league’s first decade.
In between Kline’s inaugural win and Brown’s 2006 victory, ‘The Betty’ just twice went the way of goalers.
Kangaroo Flat’s Michelle Atherton broke a 10-year drought for the goalers in 2001, while Maryborough’s Alicia Cassidy – the league’s games record holder – won it as a goaler in 2005, sharing the honour with Castlemaine’s Georgia Wills.
Like many of her league medal-winning peers, Cassidy is equally remembered for her performances in another part of the court, in her case as a force in the midcourt.
A handful, including dual winners Oliver and Stewart and Lani-Jo Bryers (1993), stamped themselves as class goalers, just not in their medal-winning seasons.
Adding to the mystery, while Betty Thompson success has eluded a long and growing list of class goalers, that has not been the case with the highest individual honour on grand final day.
The last two grand final best on court medals were awarded to goalers – Gisborne’s Skrijel (2024) and Claudia Mawson (2023).
Barkmeyer was best on court in Kangaroo Flat’s last premiership triumph in 2016 as a 16-year-old, while Lou Dupuy claimed the medal for a superb second-half performance for Golden Square in 2011, after starting the game in defence.
Asked for their opinions on the dearth of shooters on the honour roll, two of the league’s all-time best defenders Alicia McGlashan and two-time winner Stewart were adamant it did not do justice to the high calibre of goalers to have played in the league.
“To be honest, the best team of the season often don’t get the Betty because the team shared votes due to all being great players – you don’t win premierships with one standout,” she said.
“There were always lots of great goalers, but votes would be shared with other players in those good teams.
“At Kangaroo Flat, I always thought Nina Cass deserved votes because she was unstoppable in GS, but they didn’t come her way.
“She made it look easy; she was that good.
“Christie Rogers (nee Carmody) was formidable when she played goals for Eaglehawk in the BFNL.
“Smart, strong and a great leader.”
Selected in the BFNL’s 2010-19 Team of the Decade starting seven alongside Gabe Richards, Rogers made a habit of winning league medals in the Loddon Valley football league, claiming a trio of wins with Calivil United.
McGlashan, who will be chasing her seventh A-grade premiership medal in two weekend’s time following the Roos semi-final win over Sandhurst last Saturday, is hopeful her teammate Barkmeyer can break the goaler curse.
“Ruby has been phenomenal this year and definitely up for the Betty,” she said.
“Even in such a strong team.”
Stewart, now playing for Foster in the Mid Gippsland league, where she was crowned as the joint league best and fairest only last week, pointed to the perhaps higher expectations placed on goalers as a factor.
“Their expectation is to shoot the goals and maybe people don’t understand the pressure on goalers,” she said.
“Any time a goaler misses, it’s probably noticed more than any other mistake on the court.
“That might count against them in some eyes.”
A sincere Stewart said it was hard to ignore that her 15 years at Gisborne had coincided with an amazing era of midcourters in the BFNL, underpinned by three players – her Bulldogs teammate Tiana Newman, Brianna Dalrymple-Monro (Sandhurst/Strathfieldsaye) and Sartori – all having won dual medals.
“There has been some goalers very unlucky to not poll as many votes, but we have had very strong middies and defenders,” she said.
“I’ve always said that Kelsey Meade (Sandhurst) was one of the best players I have had to play on and I’m sure she deserves more votes than she gets.
“I know Gabe has been up there before (third in 2017) and Claudia Mawson, my old Gisborne teammate, is an amazing player.
“But being such a strong league, it takes a great player to win, regardless of where they play on the court.”
