FULL COVERAGE: BFNL grand final 2016
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SANDHURST’S grand final victory on Saturday moved the Dragons two flags clear of Eaglehawk as the most successful club in Bendigo league history.
The Dragons’ 32-point win over Golden Square was the club’s 28th senior flag.
Of the 28 flags, this is the first year the Dragons have won a senior premiership ending in the year 6 – the only year-ending number that had been missing from their premiership list.
Saturday’s BFNL grand final guide listed the Dragons as having won 26 previous senior premierships, but not included in that tally is Sandhurst’s 1883 flag.
The 1883 Bendigo league flag is instead credited to Eaglehawk, but in researching his book From Cardinals to Dragons detailing the history of the Dragons released in 2013, author Darren Lewis discovered Sandhurst was the 1883 premier.
A story headlined “The Lost Flag” with evidence of the 1883 premeirship featured on the back page of the Bendigo Advertiser on July 20, 2013.
Bendigo league flag tallies:
28 – Sandhurst.
26 – Eaglehawk.
24 – South Bendigo.
17 – Golden Square.
6 – Kyneton.
4 – Castlemaine, Gisborne, Rochester, Northern United.
3 – Bendigo, Echuca.
2 – Maryborough, Strathfieldsaye.
1 – Kangaroo Flat, Bendigo City, Long Gully.
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THE Dragons’ victory was just the fifth time in the past 30 Bendigo league grand finals that the premier had trailed at half-time.
Despite having had five more scoring shots, Sandhurst went into the half-time break trailing the Bulldogs by five points, 6.6 to 4.13.
Of the past 30 grand finals played, Golden Square in 2013, Eaglehawk in 2007, Sandhurst in 2004 and Castlemaine in 1992 are the only other teams to have won flags after overcoming a half-time deficit.
2013 – Golden Square trailed Strathfieldsaye by 4 points at half-time, won by 21.
2007 – Eaglehawk trailed Gisborne by 16 points at half-time, won by 2.
2004 – Sandhurst trailed Gisborne by 2 points at half-time, won by 29.
1992 – Castlemaine trailed Golden Square by 19 points at half-time, won by 5.
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SINCE winning their previous premiership in 2004 against Gisborne that snapped what was a 21-year drought, it took the Dragons another 230 games before tasting the ultimate success again on Saturday.
In between the 2004 and 2016 flags the Dragons finished 7th, 4th, 4th, 8th, 6th, 5th, 4th, 4th, 5th, 2nd and 2nd.
No players from the 2004 flag were part of Saturday’s triumph, but Keiran Nihill has been involved in both premierships.
Nihill played in the 2004 flag and was an assistant coach to Wayne Primmer for this year’s premiership.
No doubt there was plenty of pride from Nihill on Saturday given he was at the helm back in 2008 when the Dragons went back to square one with a complete rebuild in what was a tough season that yielded just one win and the club narrowly avoiding its first wooden spoon.
Among the Sandhurst side during 2008 were a baby-faced pair in Matt Thornton and Nick Stagg, who have now gone full circle from easybeats eight years ago to premiership players.
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WAYNE Primmer has now taken over the mantle from David Collins as the most recent Sandhurst premiership coach.
Primmer, 57 and a former Essendon player, was appointed Dragons’ coach in November last year and in his first chat with the Bendigo Advertiser gave a sign of things to come.
“My aim is to certainly have the players really physically fit, so that when you are put under pressure you have the capacity to think clearly,” Primmer said after the Dragons’ first training run of the pre-season.
In the euphoria of Saturday’s grand final celebrations, captain Blair Holmes, Lee Coghlan and Joel Wharton all made mention that the torturous pre-season under Primmer was pivotal in the Dragons taking the next step from runners-up the past two years to 2016 premiers.
The stats throughout the season proved that opposition teams – like Golden Square on Saturday – just didn’t have the legs to go with the Dragons, who won 18 of their 20 last quarters.
Apart from being outscored 9-27 by Strathfieldsaye in round one and 15-27 by Castlemaine in round seven in last quarters, in the Dragons’ other 18 games they were +74, +21, +16, +8, +4, +27, +13, +74, +23, +25, +16, +16, +21, +43, +7, +44, +24 and +14 in final terms.
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IN what was the first year of the player points system in the BFNL, the Dragons won the flag with a grand final team tallying 36 points.
1 point – James Coghlan, Joshua Hann, Codie Price, Lachlan Tardrew, Alex Wharton, Joel Wharton, Lachlan Ross, Matt Thornton, Lee Coghlan, Nick Stagg, Tim Martin, Blair Holmes, Koe Ngawati, Mitch Dole, Brodie Montague.
2 points – Angus Parry, Adam Parry.
3 points – Hamish Leahy, Braidon Blake, Brock Knights.
4 points – Kristan Height, Pascale Craig.
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STAR Kristan Height joins only Leigh Gathercole (2004) and inaugural winner Bill Nalder (1983) as Sandhurst players to have won the Nalder Medal for grand final best on ground.