Last Saturday he was an emergency and accompanied the reigning VFL premier to its first-round clash against Southport in Queensland in a rematch of last year’s grand final.
Depasquale’s pre-season with Werribee turned sour early when he rebroke the finger he broke early last season before he became Kyabram’s leading and the GVL’s second-leading goalkicker for the 2024 season.
He spent five weeks in rehab but has now emerged from that program and was given a quarter in a practice game against another VFL side, Footscray, last week.
He is currently employed at a school in Werribee and according to his father, Tony, is enjoying his new lifestyle but is heavily focused on trying to break into the reigning VFL premier team.
Ogden heading abroad
Kyabram’s best-and-fairest footballer from last season, Liam Ogden, will be missing for most of the GVL season due to kick-off on Saturday week.
Ogden, a multi-premiership player with the Bombers and its best ground-level player, is taking a few months off for an overseas trip.
But he expects to be back for the last five or six home-and-away rounds.
Ogden played in last Saturday’s final practice match at Elmore in the countdown to the new season.
Speedy Sam
In my early teen years, the athletic world was fascinated by the race to become the first athlete to break the four minute barrier for the mile (1609m).
It's generally accepted English athlete Roger Bannister held the honour after clocking 3 minutes 59.4 seconds in 1954 at the age of 25 years.
The mile record has since been lowered by 16.27 seconds.
As of June 2022, the four-minute barrier had been broken by 1755 athletes.
(No, I’m not one of them!)
The world record for the fastest time stands at 3:43.13, achieved by the Moroccan athlete Hicham El Guerrouj, at age 24, in 1999.
Now New Zealand’s Sam Ruthe has made history by becoming the youngest athlete to crack the four-minute barrier.
Sam who?
Ruthe is no seasoned athlete.
Amazingly he is only 15 and last week at Mount Smart Stadium in Auckland the middle-distance prodigy completed the mile in 3:58.35 with the assistance of two pacemakers, who also finished within the four-minute mark.
Who would have thought that would happen when the best runners in the world specialising in the mile race over 70 years ago found it a huge and almost unachievable challenge?
Blightly reunion planned
If you have had any association with the Blighty Football Netball Club over the past 75 years keep the date Saturday, April 26 free.
That’s when the club celebrates its 75th-year reunion.
As a small community, Blighty has has had to punch well above its weight in leagues it has competed in since 1949.
It made its debut in the former Edward River Association and made appearances in the Coreen and District Football League before joining Picola and District Football League in 1969 where it has been ever since.
For further information on the reunion go to trybooking.com/events/landing/1365380?fbclid
Benalla has high hopes
There is growing confidence that GVL club Benalla will make progress in the coming year.
It’s hit the jackpot off-field in terms of sponsorship with ForestOne jumping aboard.
ForestOne is the largest independent distributor of wood panel, timber and decorative surface material in Australia.
In footy, Benalla will field one of the youngest sides in the GVL but the club believes it will pay off in the future. Its netballers, meanwhile, are expected to be among the season’s big improvers.
Ky cricketers make the grade
Apologies to Paul Wickham and Ross Brown, the Kyabram Cricket Club players who got stumped before it was announced in last week’s Free Press what recognition they had received at Cricket Shepparton’s awards night.
To put the record straight they were both named in Cricket Shepparton’s Team of the Year awards for the 2024-5 season — Paul in B-grade and Ross in E-grade.
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