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VSSA STATE SEMI FINALIST – TOP 4

1992 Intermediate Boys Football

Our first Intermediate team (and 2nd team of any age) to make a State Semi Final.

The boys won 6 matches but lost the Semi to eventual Champions Patterson River Secondary College, by 15 points (6.14.50 – 9.11.65) with inaccurate kicking a factor, at Ransford Oval, Royal Park. 

Coach Gary Michael recalls the opposition being quite physical, with one defender being especially aggressive. Players also believe future Carlton and Essendon star Justin Murphy was playing for the opposition.

Our team boasted 1 future AFL player – Year 10 Mark Porter, who would play 110 AFL games (55 for Carlton, 55 for North Melbourne) between 1997 and 2004.

Porter was listed as 198cm (6 foot 6) and 103kg in his AFL days, and although as a Year 10 wouldn’t have reached that full size quite yet, he must have been a monster in these school games in the Ruck.

Porter played in a King Valley Thirds team that year (1992) in the Ovens & King, alongside Year 11 Leigh Newton (13 AFL games of Melbourne in 1997). They must have been one hell of a Big Man due in the 1991 Intermediate team the year before. 15-year old Porter won the club Best & Fairest in 1992, and 16-year old Newton won the League B&F (Fred Jensen Medal) playing int he Ruck. They would the following year both be in the 1993 King Valley Thirds Premiership team.

Two years later, Porter won the 1994 O&K Baker Medal (League Best & Fairest, Seniors) while in Year 12 at just 17 years of age (the youngest Baker Medalist ever). He moved straight to Melbourne in 1995 to play for VFL club Coburg, and won the the Fothergill-Round Medal (League Most Promising Young Talent). After a 2nd year at Coburg, he was Rookie Listed by Carlton. By 2001 he was Carlton’s number 1 Ruckman and was 7th in the AFL for hitouts (381).

The 1992 school team had plenty of other talent too.

Midfielder Bruce Hildebrand (teammate of Porter and Newton at King Valley including that flag in 1993 the next year), would play Seniors at Wangaratta Rovers and then for Coburg in the VFL, where he was good enough to be picked in the VFL Under 23 team.

A bumper crop of Year 9s had come up from our 1991 State Runner-Up Junior team the year prior – including 2 future Murray Bushrangers and VFL players in Rohan Graham and Mark Goodey.

Graham that year play in the 1992 U15 Ovens & Murray Schoolboys team (today’s equivalent of V-Line Cup) as a bottom-ager, and played a 2nd year in Year 10 (as Vice Captain). Two years later (1994) he would be a key forward Murray Bushrangers U18 teams of 1994, 1995 and 1996 (one season their Leading Goalkicker). 

Graham would also be that good, that he would feature in the U18 Victoria Country Teal Cup team at the National Championships, twice. First, as a bottom-ager in 1995, and then as Vice Captain in 1996 at Year Twelve. He was good enough to have 4 AFL clubs speaking to him, and to do a Pre-Season at Footscray (now Western Bulldogs), play some reserves games for Sydney Swans and some practise games for Geelong and Footscray, then spend time at Williamstown in the VFL.

Graham remains our only boy to ever be either Captain or Vice Captain of an U18 Vic Country team. Matt Graham (no relation) was Vice Captain of his U16 team in 2003.

Mark Goodey, Vice Captain of that 1991 Junior team, was another Murray Bushranger, playing 25-30 games alongside his great mate Graham, in Year 11 and 12 in 1994 and 1995. The classy midfielder would go on to play 48 Senior VFL games for Werribee, and be good enough to be named in their Top 40 players if the Decade (1993-2003).

Then there were probably the likes of Year 9s Troy Porter, Gabe Jackson an Ben Nicoll, who all played in the Rovers Thirds Premiership of 1995 as Year 12s three years later, alongside 6 other of our boys including Cameron Dunstan and Paul Flynn who may have been Year 10s in this team.

HOW THEY LINED UP – POTENTIALLY

B: Cameron Dunstan, Troy Porter, Ken White

HB: Antony Osborne, Daniel Bevan, David Furnell

C: Joel Pizzini, Brad Lamb, Will Read

HF: Justin Solimo, Rohan Graham, Cane Tonzing

F: Jonathon Wills, Barry Akers, Paul Flynn 

RUCK: Mark Porter (C), Bruce Hildebrand, Mark Goodey

INTER: Justin Nash, Mark Williams, Brad Miller, Paul Cavicchiolo