Go west young man

by NATHAN RYAN

WHILE Victorian country clubs have long battled the exodus of talent to Melbourne in search of work or education, in recent years they've been drained by a steady stream of players across the Nullabor. This season, almost 40 players from country Victoria are on list at WAFL clubs - and with good reason. Country Victorians appeal to WAFL clubs because they don't incur an interstate transfer fee. To recruit a player from the VFL, TAC Cup or SANFL a WAFL club has to fork out $10,000. But players from county, amateur or metropolitan leagues come free of charge.

West Perth has been home to many country Victorian players since AFL umpire's boss Jeff Gieschen took the coaching reins in 1992. Gieschen had led powerful Ovens and Murray club Wodonga to two premierships (1987 and 1990) and managed to entice a handful of players across the Nullabor.

Current West Perth coach Darren Harris was part of Wodonga's 1987 premiership team under the former Richmond coach. Harris transferred to Bendigo League club Golden Square, winning back-to-back flags in 1988-89, while studying primary teaching at university. He returned to Wodonga for another season under Gieschen in 1991 before deciding to head west. Harris believes moving to Perth helped him mature as a footballer and as a person.

"[Before I left for Perth] I was at a stage where I had my teaching degree but I was working at a steel foundry in Wodonga because I couldn't get a job," he said. "I wanted to make my own mark and was keen for a change so I rang Jeff and asked if I could join him.

"West Perth didn't chase me or pay for me to be relocated; I did it off my own back.

"It took a year to settle and I doubted why I'd made the move for a while but once I got a teaching job everything started to fall into place." Fall into place is an understatement. In his five years as a player at West Perth Harris excelled, winning a best and fairest, finishing runner-up twice and captaining WA in the second of two state appearances. In 2000 selectors named Harris as rover in West Perth's team of the decade (1994-2003).

However, his finest moment came in 1995 when, as captain, he led the Falcons to the premiership, ending a 20-year drought for the club. Before a crowd of almost 35,000 at Subiaco Oval, West Perth, with highly successful WAFL coach John Dimmer at the helm, smashed Subiaco by 56 points. Harris won the Simpson Medal for best afield.

The pint-sized rover returned to the O&M in 1997, but instead of heading back to Wodonga, he agreed to be playing-coach of cross-town rival Wodonga Raiders. In his first year of a three-year stint the Raiders made the grand final, going down to Albury by seven points but the following year Harris led the club to its first O&M premiership when it flogged Lavington by 64 points.

After two years working for the AFL in New South Wales as a talent program co-ordinator, Harris was installed as West Perth's coach. Now into his fourth season, his second as full-time coach, Harris has added another premiership (2003) and a grand final appearance (2002) to his list of achievements.

During his time as coach Harris has used his contacts throughout country Victoria to act as scouts for potential recruits. He believes players performing well in the state's top country leagues, Ovens and Murray, Goulburn Valley and Geelong, are capable of stepping up to WAFL standard. "It's a great place to test yourself because it's a step up in fitness and speed but if you do get fit there is a lot of ball to be had because the grounds are so much bigger," Harris said. "The better players in Victoria get tagged, belted heavily and it can be pretty tough - it's town against town and fierce competitions.

"The WAFL is so much more free-flowing, it's fair to say there's 13 or 14 onballers running around." At season's end Harris flies east with West Perth officials to meet prospective recruits and their parents and often uses his own experiences as a recruiting tool. "We try to do our homework and we get a hit list of about 50 to pick up three or four quality players - once we see they are good characters we get really interested," Harris said. "Most of the guys are looking for a lifestyle change, a chance to have a look around and to get away from their home town for a while.

"We try and target blokes between the 19 to 21 age group and hope that they'll stay for four or five years.

"They're not as expensive as getting someone from the VFL. These days we fly them over and relocate them but it's still a lot cheaper than paying the $10,000 interstate transfer fee."

This season Harris enticed Rochester key forward Ben Anderson as well as young Sandhurst trio Darren Atkinson, Mark Fitzgerald and Zac Perez to West Perth.

Anderson, 22, had been a regular Goulburn Valley interleague representative and also gained Victoria Country selection in 2002 while Atkinson, Fitzgerald and Perez were part of Sandhurst's grand final triumph against Gisborne in the Bendigo League last year.

Atkinson (19) became hot property after he was best afield in the grand final. The athletic ruckman, who measures in at 196cm and 93kg, has been impressive in his first WAFL season. While Atkinson concedes he misses his family and friends in Victoria the former Bendigo Pioneer is delighted to have made the move. "I needed a change and I'm rapt I came over," he said. "I'm not sure how long I'll stay - I can't really see myself going home at this stage.

"The lifestyle is so good over here. The good weather makes it easy to go to training and the beaches are great - I'm hours away from a good beach at home."

Atkinson, whose father David kicked 100 goals in a season for Ballarat League club Redan, was part of Bendigo Bombers squad last year but struggled to win a place in the VFL team because of the high number of Essendon players dropping back. "Because the Bendigo Bombers didn't have twos (reserves) last year there would only be four or five blokes that you would train with playing in the team," he said. "West Perth is a lot more tight-knit group and there's more opportunity than the VFL."

While Atkinson and most country Victorians cross to the WAFL in their late teens or early twenties former Kyabram and Corowa-Rutherglen bigman David Lucas made the journey west at 28. Lucas, one of country Victoria's finest ruckmen of the past decade, lobbed at Subiaco's doorstep in 2002. His move was not football related. He and wife Christie decided they wanted to see more of Australia and had heard great things about Perth. But a phone call from Corowa-Rutherglen president Rod Campbell to his son Brad, who was an established Subiaco player, saw Lucas join the powerful club. "I hadn't thought much about footy when I arrived," Lucas said. "I took eight weeks to travel over when all the boys were training. Rod mentioned something to Brad and one thing led to another."

Lucas was an instant hit in the WAFL winning Subiaco's best and fairest award in his first season and finishing runner-up in the Sandover Medal in 2003. He returned to Corowa-Rutherglen last year to be closer to family following the birth of his first child, Jett. But after a couple of months in Victoria Lucas realised Perth was where he wanted to live and informed the club that he would be returning west at the end of the season.

"It was just a lifestyle decision, we missed the weather and all the things you can do in Perth," he said. "The WAFL is a good competition and having three or four AFL players in each team makes it stronger. "The top players in the Ovens and Murray could play in it but there's no one just making up the numbers like there sometimes is in the country."

Perth has by far the most country Victorian players, with 17, while East Perth contains seven. The number is likely to fall in the coming years after the nine WAFL teams decided to limit the number of interstate recruits to six per club by the end of the season. However, current interstate players on WAFL lists will be included as local players from 2006.

EAST FREMANTLE: Luke Durling (Shepparton Swans), Joel Sofi (Shepparton United); EAST PERTH: Lee Anderson (Maffra), Brent Cowell (Bairnsdale), Brendan Hancock (Leitchville-Gunbower), Gary Jones (Maffra), Ryan McKenzie (Corowa-Rutherglen), Andrew Mills (Euroa), Matthew Mills (Corowa-Rutherglen); PEEL THUNDER: Graeme Fruean (Albury), Patrick Travers (Newtown-Chilwell), Joel White (Albury), Justin Wood (St Albans); PERTH: Ben Batalha (Maffra), Sam Boake (Tocumwal), Broderick Church (Heywood), Brett Edwards (Ararat), David Hassett (Caramut), Daniel Jones (Echuca), Jarrod Kayler-Thompson (Mansfield/Newtown-Chilwell), Troy Kneebone (Drouin), Daniel Leslie (North Albury), Daniel Maher (Benalla), Damian McMahon (Newtown-Chilwell), Kurt Niklaus (Warrnambool), Bernard Price (Yarrawonga), Patrick Tucker (St Albans, Geelong), Ryan Webster (Gisborne), Alan Wilson (Leongatha); SUBIACO: Jay Campbell (Corowa-Rutherglen), David Lucas (Corowa-Rutherglen); SWAN DISTRICTS: Julian Leplastrier (Wangaratta Rovers); WEST PERTH: Ben Anderson (Rochester), Darren Atkinson (Sandhurst), Dustin Burns (Wodonga Raiders), Mark Fitzgerald (Sandhurst), Zac Perez (Sandhurst). South Fremantle and Claremont have no country Victorian players on their lists.

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