Walking towards the clubrooms at Central Park Recreation Reserve on a Thursday evening, the setting is exactly how you would picture the final training session before round one.
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With the crunch of the gravel road under each step, you can see cars wrapped around the oval as men, women, boys and girls walk to the change rooms to prepare for the night of training ahead.
The sky changes from sunset to dusk within the blink of an eye as the temperature drops and the floodlights are switched on.
Winter is fast approaching and so is football and netball.
Shepparton East Football Netball Club is part of the Kyabram District League, but it hasn’t always been as club stalwarts are quick to talk about the club’s fluid history in the ever-changing landscape of country sport.
The club has long been part of the Goulburn Valley football and netball tapestry as popular club figure Ronny Davies remembers the various names, colours and emblems the club has had over the years.
While Shepparton East may have in the past been yellow and black as Tigers and are currently blue and gold as Eagles, for Davies, he most resonates with his time at the club when they were the Shepparton East Bombers.
Davies, now 72, said he had been involved with Shepparton East since the day he was born, when his father helped rebuild the club.
“Played over 300 games of firsts and seconds; I was never a star, though,” Davies said with a gravelly chuckle.
“I’ve remained involved since then, and I do my bit around the place, like with the Stars; it helps make it a bit easier for someone, and it’s good fun; the club is filled with a lot of good people, like tonight it’s a good social gathering.
“Had the family all involved here, and they are all moved on now, but I have stuck around; there are people that I have made good friendships with, both male and female, it doesn’t matter who, I have just stuck around and enjoyed it.
“That’s what it’s all about.”
The dusky night fades to dark and whistles can be heard ringing out over the whole ground as coaches across both codes instruct and encourage their players.
Footballers and netballers can be seen on the courts and the field, running and puffing, trying to put in one last effort to prove themselves ready for the club’s round one match against Longwood.
Saturday’s match will be special to Shepparton East for a number of reasons as it hosts a sponsors and premiership reunion day for players from the 1994 senior, 2004 senior, 2004 reserves and 2014 thirds flags.
President Stewart Cook — who occasionally moonlights as a water boy for the senior side when it needs him — said the club had a clear picture of what kind of community it wants to create.
“We are just Shepp East locals that want to be involved with the club,” Cook said.
“We are trying to be a one-stop shop for families, with netball and football for parents, boys and girls; all abilities football as well and they are such a big part of the club and it feels like they have always been here.
“We have got guys cooking a barbecue for the players on Thursday night; they don’t get to run out and play on Saturday.
“They could be doing better things, but they want to help out and they want to be involved in this football netball club.”
The two guys behind the barbecue, which was sizzling away in the background, were Gerard Doyle and Chris Keady.
Dressed casually, tongs in hand, flipping burgers and shooting the breeze with one another.
Upon first glance, Doyle appears to simply be a friendly, outgoing volunteer who has given up his Thursday night to pitch in and support his local club, as many volunteers do at football and netball clubs.
But Doyle is more than a volunteer, having been a part of Shepparton East premierships as a player and a coach.
Being involved with the club across multiple decades, Doyle has seen the club go through peaks and troughs, while he has also seen Shepparton East change colours, emblems, names and leagues.
So what motivation drives him to stick around at the club and volunteer his time on a Thursday night, manning the barbecue while the football side kicks the pigskin?
The answer is simple: his love for the family-focused club and his eagerness to support district sport.
“District football is sometimes overlooked, I think, and country football clubs are so important,” Doyle said.
“Because there may be kids in town who don’t quite get a game at the higher level, they think that it’s not worth playing any more when that’s totally wrong.
“You can come out to a district football club and get so much enjoyment.
“There is so much more than just football; there’s good people that you meet, jobs can come out of it, that sort of thing.
“I think it’s a really good place to bring a young family out to and I think that is the most important part and something that we really pride ourselves on.”
The person-first, athlete-second culture Shepparton East is trying to build is a style that is growing more popular in sports.
One clear example in a professional capacity is last year’s AFL premier Collingwood, whose captain Darcy Moore and coach Craig McRae were champions of that slogan-belief.
During his recent time in the role of president, Cook said the club had put an emphasis on recruiting players focused on their character as well as their footballing nous.
“We want good people over good players,’’ Cook said.
“Don’t let my committee members hear that because they also want to win.”
“Because there may be kids in town who don’t quite get a game at the higher level, they think that it’s not worth playing any more when that’s totally wrong.”
In his first season back in charge of the senior Eagles football side, 2016 premiership coach Dwain Vidler knows how important it is to have the right people involved at a club.
“It’s a club where only the good people stick around,” Vidler said.
“It’s a bit of a no-d*ckhead policy and I think that has helped the club keep the people involved off the field for as long as they can because good people attract good people.”
Like all football and netball clubs across Australia, Shepparton East realises it isn’t run perfectly and there are always areas to improve on and off the field.
One of those improvements the club believes is growing the connection between the football and netball sides.
As Cook rightly said, “one can’t survive without the other”.
Co-coach of the A and B-grade side Kate Durling said although the club had started to make progress on closing the divide between the two halves of the club, there was always more that could be done.
“I think that same issue is with all clubs,” Durling said.
“I think there is a divide with the netball and the football, but with SheppEast, we are trying to do co-trainings together, we are trying to mingle in with functions and things like that, so we are definitely trying to stop that divide.
“I have a partner that plays, so I think it is important to have that non-divide as well and I think there are a few girls at our club now that have partners that play and I think that helps the camaraderie in the group.”
In recent years, one way Shepparton East has looked to become more rounded, family-friendly and opportunity-laden is through its connection with the Goulburn Valley Stars.
The Stars were created in 2014 and are a football program dedicated to helping people with an intellectual or physical disability to play Australian rules football.
Cook believes the Stars players have quickly intertwined themselves within the fabric of Shepparton East.
“They (GV Stars) train here on a Thursday night and then they come in and have tea with us after training,” he said.
“They play their round-robin game here each year and either the football club runs that or runs the canteen for them for the day.
“They are fantastic and they are just like everybody else; they just want to be part of a club and so we have invited them in to be a part of our club and it is one of the best moves we have ever made.”
After training is done and dusted, footballers and netballers file into the clubrooms for dinner.
On tonight’s menu are burgers.
And they are gobbled without delay.
Behind the bar sits Ron Davies and his mate, another club stalwart, Malcolm Watt.
The two chat — albeit in small doses given the steady stream of customers (players only drinking softies, of course) — back and forth before the senior football coach approaches to ask a favour.
“Would one of you guys be able to count our inside 50s on Saturday?” Vidler said.
“Yes, but I won’t be here until the second quarter,” Watt responds.
“Yep, that’s fine.”
It’s probably not a conversation you would hear at AFL level, but it’s an endearing glimpse into the world of country football and all the people who help support a club in any way they can.
Once dinner was eaten, the canteen ladies thanked and the housekeeping addressed; the teams from all grades in senior football and netball were read out to applause as a sense of anticipation grew for the first game of the season.
“I love the club; I played here all my life, Dad played his footy here and he was the vice-president; my grandfather played his footy here,” Cook said.
Arriving at the ground on Saturday, all the sounds of local sport come rushing straight at you, shouts of “ball” and whistles blown as the reserve side plays, while the B-grade netball is in full swing with shouts of “c’mon girls” reverberating around the courts.
The day’s play started well, with the under-18 football and all junior netball sides (under-11 to under-17) claiming strong wins.
Meanwhile, Shepparton East’s senior football and netball reserve sides were similarly dominant in their victories over Longwood.
In the clubrooms, the reunion and sponsors day speeches were wrapping up as everyone was reminded of the story of the 2004 senior premiership, which happened to be played — the first grand final was a draw, so it was replayed the following week — in the worst possible conditions for football with wind, mud and rain.
Polar opposite conditions to what was presented to the senior footballers and A-grade netballers as the sun shone, the wind was still and everyone was ready to cheer East home to cap a great start to the season.
In the football, Vidler’s side took early control of the match over the Redlegs, scoring quickly and heavily.
Two of Shepparton East’s forwards, Hysen Ismet and Jake Sutherland (who looked like the reincarnation of the AFL’s thundering key forward Charlie Dixon), kicked a bag of six goals each as the seniors ran out victors 21.9 (135) to 3.5 (23).
Fifty metres away, the A-grade netballers put on a similar performance as they looked to back up last year’s premiership-winning season.
Led on court by co-coaches Bianca Kelly and Durling, the Eagles were unstoppable against Longwood, defeating it 67-16.
Victories to start the season across all grades would have brought a smile to Cook’s face, but the club’s workhorse leader would have been equally happy to see the number of families and children who came out to support Shepparton East on Saturday afternoon.
“I love the club; I played here all my life, Dad played his footy here and he was the vice-president; my grandfather played his footy here,” Cook said.
“Born and bred in Shepp East just down the road, and I’m 41, so I have been around here for 41 years.
“I have had a few years away, but I spent as much time as I could here as a kid, and now I am trying to do the same for my kids.”
Cadet Sports Journalist