LVFNL: 20-year finals wait finally comes to an end for Blues

But while making the Loddon Valley Football Netball League senior finals is a significant accomplishment for Inglewood that has been two decades in the making, Blues coach Darrell Billett is far from content with simply qualifying.

Now that the Blues are back at the business end of the season they want to make an impact - starting in Sunday's elimination final against Bridgewater at Newbridge.

It has been an arduous road the Blues have traveled over the past 20 years since their last finals appearance in 2003 where for the long-time and loyal Inglewood faithful there at times must have felt like there was no light at the end of a dark tunnel.

READ MORE: SELECTION NIGHT: weekend football teams for the BFNL, HDFNL, LVFNL, NCFL, CVFLW

There's a saying that you have to know the past to understand the present and given the mighty tough two decades the Blues have experienced their finals return is arguably the feelgood story for football this year.

The last finals series the Blues contested was in 2003 when coached by Kieran Byrne.

In what was the year where Calivil United would go on to win the first of its six premierships in a row the Blues ended the home and away season third on the ladder with a 13-5 record.

The Blues lost the qualifying final to Calivil United by nine points, defeated Bears Lagoon-Serpentine by 47 points in the first semi-final and then, in what remains their last finals appearance, lost the preliminary to Mitiamo by 67 points.

What then followed was year after year of being mired either on or close to the bottom of the ladder, including at one stage losing 51-consecutive games.

In between that last finals appearance in 2003 and this season's return 20 years later, the Blues claimed 11 wooden spoons, including five in a row between 2011 and 2015 when they won just four of 80 games.

Their senior record from 2004-2022 was 31-253 from 284 games, with 96 of those 253 losses by more than 100 points.

The Blues have essentially spent the best part of 20 years as a club that on the rare occasions it won a game it was headline news out of the Loddon Valley league.

And that's the past that makes what the Blues have been able to achieve in the present of putting year after year of struggle behind them to win their way back into the finals such a significant accomplishment.

The Blues head into their long-awaited finals return having ended the home and away season fourth with a 9-7 record and, understandably, there is an enormous level of excitement around the community.

For not only are the Blues' seniors in the finals, so too are their reserves, while their under-18s will be in action on Saturday in the AFL Central Victoria under-18 qualifying final.

"There's a lot of excitement around the club and the community... our last home game a couple of weeks ago was the biggest crowd I've seen in years," Billett said this week.

"I'm seeing a lot of people at the footy now that I haven't seen in ages and they are all really upbeat with where the club is at.

"It has been 20 years since the club last played in a senior final, so it's very much an exciting feeling."

There was a sense early last year that 2022 could be the season that the finals drought would end for the Blues after they made a flying start, winning three of their first four games and optimism was high.

But from an encouraging 3-1 the Blues lost their last 13 games to tumble down to eighth and finish above only Calivil United.

This year, though, the Blues have been able to sustain their consistency over the course of the entire home and away season to secure their finals return.

READ MORE: Football preview, tips, how they match-up - BFNL, HDFNL, LVFNL

Sunday's opponent Bridgewater is only a short 7.5km trip up the Calder Highway from Inglewood, but in terms of recent success, there has been an enormous gulf between the two clubs.

In the 20 years since Inglewood last played a final the Mean Machine has played in 28 and won seven premierships.

"Even though it's very much a different group at Bridgewater to the years when they were winning all those premierships (seven in a row from 2010-16), most of their blokes this weekend played in last year's grand final," Billett said.

"So when you look at it like that, there's a huge gap in experience in terms of what they've done and what we've done.

"I'm sure there's going to be a fair bit of nervous energy among our group because they're all relatively young and how they adapt to it... you don't want them playing the game in their heads beforehand.

"With the lack of finals experience there's obviously the question mark of how the boys are going to cope in terms of what finals are all about. But the boys are all really excited and looking forward to the opportunity."

Billett talking about his playing group being excited for the opportunity to play in a final is in stark contrast to just over two years ago when he came into the Addy office in July of 2021 during one of the frustrating COVID pauses of the season to discuss the Blues' major on-field challenges.

It was at a time when the Blues had just been held goal-less in three of their previous four games and been constantly smashed from pillar to post on the field.

The 2021 season coming out of the COVID-abandoned 2020 hadn't been kind to Inglewood - a club that has a history dating back to 1876.

Still reeling after losing 52 players following the 2019 season, the Blues were forced to throw essentially a team of kids to the wolves every week and the results weren't pretty, but Billett did close that Addy interview with a sense of optimism when looking towards the future.

"Obviously, the scores we're dishing up will make it hard to entice blokes to have a look at us, but you never know," said Billett, who is an Inglewood 1986 premiership player and Team of the Century member.

"I know the scores don't look that way at the moment, but with the right people in it can turn pretty quick."

And turn it has. Only two years after losing the 12 games they played in the COVID-shortened 2021 by margins of 167, 166, 207, 84, 70, 84, 236, 177, 140, 248, 120 and 166 points the Blues are now a finals team.

"It was hard to watch back in 2021, there's no sugar-coating that, and we were obviously hoping we'd improve, but it's fair to say it has come fairly quick," Billett said.

"Generally at footy clubs you'll get half-a-dozen players come in, but you'll lose half-a-dozen as well out the back door.

"We just couldn't afford to do that and we've been fortunate that we've not only been able to keep our group together, but get some good players in and keep them.

"Our whole committee has been really solid over the past couple of years of this journey knowing full well the results that were going to come our way in 2021 were going to be horrendous.

"That was basically just a year to keep the gates open after COVID had a huge impact on the club.

"But we knew that if we could just keep it together and pick up some good players we'd be on the up and we were able to do that last year with the boys like Charlie Ingham, Charlie McGaw, Alex Lowe, Tom Kennedy and Bregon Cotchett.

"We were also able to get some guys through the university, which gave me some belief that we could improve and we saw that early winning three of our first four games before we fell away because we just didn't have the depth.

"Going into this season we were able to add to the group again. We picked up Sam Dorevitch, Darcy Hogan from Strathfieldsaye, Fergus and Keelan Payne, the two Dimboola boys Sam and Daniel Polack and Isaac Povey has played good footy for us.

"And to be quite honest, I don't think we lost a player over the summer, which is unheard of, so we were able to add to the group rather than having to bring in players to replace others who had gone just to get back to square one."

MORE FOOTBALL: Bendigo Advertiser FootyHQ

Among the nine home and away wins for the Blues this year have been a pair of victories over Sunday's opponent, Bridgewater.

Inglewood's round three win over Bridgewater was an early sign of the growth that would come this year given it was the Blues' first over the Mean Machine since 2008.

In between the Blues had lost 27 in a row against the Mean Machine by an average of 94 points.

While proud of his group that has put Inglewood back on the map as a competitive football team, Billett says the Blues are far from content at simply reaching the finals.

"We're not just there to play one final and say what a great year that was," said Billett, who was appointed Blues coach in November of 2019 for a second stint having previously coached the club from 2006-2008.

"If we get beaten on Sunday then we will be really disappointed.

"We've been able to beat Bridgewater twice this season and that gives us the confidence and belief that we are good enough to beat them.

"We want to go as far as we possibly can."

While Inglewood has been a club for the past two decades synonymous with its on-field battles, it's a club that is steeped in history.

It's a club that can lay claim to being one of 12 founding members in 1877 of the Victorian Football Association.

It's a club that is linked to the first Brownlow medallist, Edward 'Carji' Greeves, who in 1935 spent a season coaching the Blues as their first paid coach.

It's a club that won the first LVFL premiership in 1903, and in 1971 became the first team in the competition's history to win a flag undefeated.

It's a club that pioneered netball in the district, playing two games against Bears Lagoon-Serpentine in 1950, before an official Loddon Valley competition - initially known as basketball - was formed the following year.

And this weekend it's finally a club finally back in the LVFNL senior finals.

2004 - 9^th (0-16, 14.0%)

2005 - 9^th (0-16, 35.1%)

2006 - 9^th (0-16, 29.1%)

2007 - 8^th (4-12, 63.4%)

2008 - 7^th (5-11, 80.7%)

2009 - 7^th (3-13, 59.3%)

2010 - 6^th (5-11, 77.4%)

2011 - 9^th (1-15, 39.0%)

2012 - 9^th (0-16, 35.5%)

2013 - 9^th (1-15, 44.9%)

2014 - 9^th (1-15, 32.0%)

2015 - 9^th (1-15, 38.0%)

2016 - 7^th (5-11, 75.9%)

2017 - 9^th (1-15, 44.5%)

2018 - 9^th (1-15, 47.3%)

2019 - 9^th (0-16, 34.1%)

2020 - no season

2021 - 9^th (0-12, 13.6%)

2022 - 8^th (3-13, 53.1%)

2023 - 4^th (9-7, 105.3%)

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can access our trusted content: