Better late than never.
That’ll will be the attitude many Doncaster East fans will have in the early rounds of the 2021 Premier Division season following a seemingly endless wait to finally take part in the top tier of the Eastern Football Netball League.
The Lions trials and tribulations have been well documented.
Two Division Two Grand Final losses, against Doncaster in 2015 and Knox in 2017. In 2018 they were champions, on a day to remember as they put Lilydale to the sword, but a league re-structure left them in the second tier, albeit named Division One.
Not to be deterred the Lions came hard once again, almost unchallenged as they went onto win a second straight premiership in 2019 to finally claim their place in the Premier Division.
Enter a worldwide pandemic.
Despite the seemingly never ending hurdles, the Lions players have returned to the training track in incredible condition according to well entrenched coach Steve Buckle, with the carrot of top flight football enough to keep his charges motivated over the lengthy hiatus.
“Our boys came back in really good shape and super excited to get going and there’s no doubt that the added thrill of finally getting to play in the Premier Division has helped that,”
“It’s ended up being a two or three year journey with re-structures and then Covid-19.”
Enjoyment was the order of the day prior to Christmas in the pre-season schedule, but with the season creeping ever closer the Lions have focused on increasing their running capacity, aware that the step up in class will need them to be fitter than ever.
“Before Christmas training was really skill focused with not a hell of a lot of running, with the aim of getting the boys back together and moving together and enjoy being around the club again,”
“Since the new year we’ve really ramped up the running because we know we need to be another 25-30% fitter than what we had to be in Division One,”
“We realise the challenge in front of us and the boys have really taken it in their stride and stepped up to the plate.”
The Lions will have a slightly new look in 2021, with a trio of Premiership stars departing the club for a variety of reasons.
Michael Steven has relocated to the Sunshine Coast, ex Carlton and Melbourne midfielder Brock McLean has finally hung up the boots and Premiership skipper Nick Batsanis has taken up a playing assistant coaching role in the MPNFL with Rosebud.
Nick Batsanis has left the Lions Den – Photo Davis Harrigan
Maverick Weller, who the Lions picked up ahead of the cancelled 2020 season, has also left the club having moved back to his home state of Tasmania.
Another of their key 2020 inclusions Zac Clarke will remain at the Den whilst Sam Rowe will finally pull on the colours after being a late call up to St Kilda’s list ahead of the 2019 AFL Season.
2017 and 2019 VAFA Team of the Year player Jackson Green has also joined from Marcellin OC.
The Lions have become well known for their aggressive high scoring game style, taking advantage of their condensed home ground at Zerbes.
Despite going from the hunted to the hunters, Buckle is adamant that their game plan will not change on the whole, but admits they’ll have to be more risk adverse when moving the ball forwards.
“We’ve discussed the ground sizes that’ll we’ll be coming up against this year and to be honest there’s not that many really big grounds,”
“Vermont is pretty small, Blackburn is similar to our patch, so a lot of the grounds aren’t going to be foreign to us, so we’ll still like to be an attacking team with quality ball movement,”
“But obviously we’ll have to make a few tweaks to our defensive structure behind the football, because we know if we turn the footy over in the top flight we’re going to pay a very high price.”
Their Premier Division rivals should treat the Lions with the utmost respect in 2021, with Buckle and co not content with just reaching the EFNL top tier.
“We’re an ambitious team and an ambitious club and we want to be the best we can,”
“Ultimately we want to be in the pointy end, we’re not here just to survive, we want to go in and have an impact and carry on the winning culture that we’ve created over the past five or six years,”
“We’ll still be trying to achieve the ultimate, because that’s what you play footy for.”
Doncaster East host 2019 runners-up Blackburn on the 17th of April to kick off their 2021 campaign.