Taking dreams, plans and potential with it.

South Bendigo and success are names that still tend to go hand in hand, but it is an illusion, ephemeral.

Can you even believe it is 28 years since the Bloods won a premiership even though it has collected 24 in its 125-year history?

But 28 years. That's generations of players who have literally shed blood for the club and come up empty handed. It takes a good memory to recall the last time the club even played finals in the seniors.

So looking around at other South clubs, let's take South Melbourne turned Sydney Swans and its 148 years in its various incarnations, as a case in point.

The Swans have only managed 10 flags in all those years - and only five of those were in the VFL/AFL. Yet there's this aura of success around the Swans which seems to cloak its very bloody ordinary history.

Bendigo's Bloods, by comparison, has been almost dynastic in its glory days. The club won the last premiership of the 19th century and the first of the 20th.

Between 1900 and 1925 it put together a staggering 12 premierships. The dynasty was back in the 1950s - taking out 1950, '51, '54, '55 and '56. Some lean years followed, with just two flags (one in the 1960s and one in the 1970s) but the club exploded in the 1990s with four flags in five years.

Sadly that explosion soon became an implosion from 1995 on - and the pain has gone on and on.

The rest of the league was doing to South Bendigo what it had suffered through the duration of the club's dominations.

It is a legacy that now haunts the former league powerhouse; and the burden of exorcising the club's demons has fallen on coach Nathan Horbury, who has been faced with not just running and rebuilding a team, he's had to do most of the work in the depths of the global pandemic that is covid.

But there's a certain something about the boys this season. They're not a lock, but they are looking likely for the first time in a long time.

And while there's still a few key games to guarantee their spot in the top five, the Bloods aren't shying away from finals prep; they're facing the future head on - because there's nowhere left to hide.

For Horbury it's a campaign that's only been four years in the making, for those pinning their hopes on him it is seven times that. No pressure mate.

"I genuinely did think in our first year that we had some of the better young boys coming through," he said. "I knew they had great character and I guess it was just tapping into that and getting the most out of it.

"The likes of Brock Harvey and Will Keck who are coming through and playing some of the footy they are at the moment - along with some of the many other boys - has just been the most pleasing thing."

Now the plan is to get the best out of them, the most we can, as we watch them develop and grow, Horbury added.

The coach arrived at South Bendigo at the end of 2018, his wife Holly the link to the club.

His first year coaching in 2019 would be the league's last full season. Since then it has, at times, descended to the farcical it has been so on and so off so often.

Until now.

Now Horbury has had a whole season with which to work and is targeting a finals series as well.

"I know our first year probably wasn't what we wanted it to be and not what we envisioned," he conceded, "the 2021 season we were building something really good before covid derailed it all again."

But the Bloods kept that form and were able to pick it up this year, where they left off in 2021.

"We're having some really good wins and we're seeing so much development out of our younger players," Horbury said. "And to be in games against some of the top sides and sometimes roll them is great."

Horbury admitted while some teams surely took his side's strong run in 2021 as a typical 'flash in the pan' this season has proved it came down to the boys' character - and the culture of the club.

"I certainly don't think sides thought we were going to be challenging them at this early stage," he said. "Sure, we still need to win games to play finals, but I guess the most pleasing thing is the way our character has built. There's been times in games where we've been down and out."

He's of course referencing the last time South lined up against Sandhurst.

"The way we've developed - to come back in and win games - is probably, for me and for our supporters, the proudest thing I've been a part of," Horbury said.

"It's just a really good group to be coaching."

While there have been some new additions along the way, Cooper Leon, Ollie Simpson and Michael Herlihy from Numurkah to name a few, the Bloods have held onto a lot of the 2019 team - thanks to that culture, according to Horbury and club president Rick Townsend.

"It's an exciting future at South Bendigo," Townsend said. "It's a really good club, strong values and a really good culture. And it's a place where people love to be because we don't lose players.

"At the end of each year if a player has to leave it's usually for work or travelling or things like that. It says a lot about the club - everyone enjoys themselves and that's what it's all about."

A finals campaign isn't the only thing South has brewing in the future. After many, many, many years in the making, the club is preparing to make the permanent shift from the QEO to Harry Trott oval.

After having the club's football juniors and seniors train in separate locations, seemingly since the dawn of time, the final touches are to be applied to the home ground where the seniors will debut in round one of the 2023 season.

"Definitely brings the club together," Townsend said, "the juniors are just finishing as the seniors come on, so there's a connection there between the juniors and U18s coming through as well.

"It's tough to try and fit everyone on this oval, so the positive is we're using some of the local schools and that gives us a connection to the schools, particularly the primary schools.

"That's where our future lies as well, so there's a benefit there."

While the original ribbon cutting date was August 20, Townsend said at the end of the day the committee didn't mind waiting until next year to open their doors and cement their place in the community as it signalled the Blood's eyes on the future.

"We've come a long way," he said. "When I started in 2014 we were rock bottom as a club. Bottom of the ladder in football and netball, financially we were struggling.

"But with hard work and a really good core group of people on the committee, we've really improved just incrementally over the years.

"We haven't tried to spend a lot of money to buy premierships, we've done it organically really which has been important.

"And the other exciting thing for us is netball is now a really strong club. We've got all grades of netball in the finals as well.

"We're not quite there with the seniors, we're sitting fourth at the moment. But if we win the games we should win over the next five weeks we should be right."

And while it's the boys' character for Horbury, and the community for the club, for Townsend South's secret ingredient is the coaching.

"We've got really, really good coaches both in netball and football and the players are buying into what the coaches are saying, so it's just a system and a structure (that works for us)," he said.

Reflecting on the tail-end of the season Townsend said their success against the teams surrounding them in the ladder was fantastic to see.

"And a couple of those games we were down in the last quarter, but we were able to get over and win those," he said. "(Just look at) Kyneton, we were winning all day, and when Kyneton challenged us we were still able to win a close one.

"I think that says a lot about the boys belief in their game and belief in the coaching style."

At the end of the day however, it doesn't come down to one singular ingredient.

"It's across the board rather than one or two things that we've seen the success in the last couple of years," Townsend said.

So, whichever you decide their secret ingredient is - culture, character, or community - the Bloods have it in spades.

They have spent years digging themselves out of the league's wilderness, so the spades have come in handy, now they'll be digging trenches for the fight ahead.

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