Gallery | Goulburn Valley League launches A-grade competition with round one action

Shepparton would welcome Tatura to town, a rematch of 2024’s elimination final when Stacey Thompson’s side upended the red, white and blue in another early finals exit.

Now under the stewardship of reigining Wellman Family medallist Kim Borger, the Bears sought to get on the early hunt against a formidable Elsie Boyer-led visiting outfit, but there was no clear early ascendancy.

With a singular goal in it at the end of a tight-fisted first term, the girls were at least less bothered by wind as their footballing counterparts on the Deakin Reserve oval.

That said, Shepparton more than kicked it up a notch as huge moments in defence began to rapidly give way to lightning-quick transitions and feeds as Borger really started to go to work.

With something of a gap opening towards the half, there was a scary moment as Bulldogs goaler Jasmine Fraser appeared to suffer a head knock seconds prior to the main interval, though she walked off albeit without taking further part in the game.

Last year’s interleague call-up Julia Clarke was doing plenty inside and outside of the arc, but things were starting to get away from the westerners as Shepparton’s reinforced defensive unit — bolstered by former Bulldog Molly Kennedy — took a grip on proceedings.

Industriously, the Bears continued to take two out of three goals when they needed to as the gap, while rarely looking game-breaking, continued to drift ever so slightly out of Tatura’s reach.

By the 60-minute bell, it was four points in the bag after a resolute display had the maroon and gold outfit walk away a 62-50 winner.

An admittedly understrength side did everything that could be asked of it, according to the now one-for-one Bears boss.

“I’m definitely the kind of person who thrives when the challenge is thrown at me, but today made it so easy because things were flying really well,” Borger said.

“We had a few outs with nationals and injuries, so we were somewhat strapped, but needless to say it worked quite well.

“We spoke about trying to increase the intensity (at quarter-time); I felt we were stuck in second gear, so a few key turnovers changed the momentum.

“We executed to put away those chances when they came and we also had Ruby Higgins come up from B-grade, who has stepped up well.

“She’ll be fantastic for us and we can rely on her in those clutch moments.”

While Benalla will serve as something of an unknown entity for the Deakin Reserve natives in round two, the comprehensive job the Swans did across town on the Saints will naturally leave Shepparton a comfortable favourite.

However, that doesn’t matter in Borger’s eyes.

“We’re going in with the same mentality as we did for Tat, as you never know,” Borger said.

“You have to give every team in this league the same respect and we’ll go in there to fix a couple of things we needed to work on from this week.”

Around the rest of the A-grade framework, there were wins for pretty much everybody who would have eyes on a deep run this year.

Echuca’s opening victory came anything but easily, mind you, forced to grind it out to the bitter end in a nail-biting 44-41 triumph over a plucky Shepparton United.

The Swans made a blistering start to 2025 at Princess Park courtesy of a 59-21 rout at Benalla’s expense, while Mooroopna and Seymour continued the good news for 2024 finalists with sizeable wins over Mansfield and Rochester, respectively.

Rounding out the action later on Saturday, reigning premiership side Euroa made an emphatic first impression on its premiership defence by thumping Kyabram 75-33 in a twilight fixture.