Kyabram premiership coach Dave Williams took an unusual “back seat” on Friday when Rochester premiership footballers from three golden eras gathered for the annual Melbourne supporters’ luncheon on Friday.
The club had Carlton Football Club president Luke Sayers as its keynote speaker, host of the event and former Network 10 television personality Brad McEwan (a former Tigers player and Rochester schoolboy) revealing the fact he had spent seven years of his childhood living in the town.
Williams was approached to speak at the event, but pushed forward another of the Tigers legends — Rob Aitken.
Aitken, who played with Hawthorn at Under-19 and reserve-grade level in the 1970s, was a star for the Tigers in its formative Goulburn Valley League days and is a former president.
His youngest son, Heath, was a star Goulburn Valley League player and a member of the Tigers’ 1999 premiership as a 16 year old.
Williams remained as one of several well-known faces in the crowd, which also included Essendon and Hawthorn ruckman Paul Salmon and Carlton’s Team of the Century full-back Geoff Southby.
Another strong Kyabram connection at the event was former star winger and decorated Cooma cricketer Bill Fry.
Fry was runner of the Williams-coached 1992 premiership Rochester team and owned the Rochester sports store for six years.
For a time, McEwan and Tigers 1999 premiership captain Simon McCarty — a lifelong friend of McEwan — worked at the store.
Now at Lakes Entrance, where he opened a sports store and has lived for 30 years, Fry employed McEwan and McCarty as teenagers to work part-time at his store.
Fry is a regular visitor to Kyabram, visiting his wife’s 90-year-old mother Joan at her Dawes Rd home every three months.
His father Peter (who died at 95) was a renowned sportsman and a former Kyabram district league McNamara Medallist with Merrigum. Bill captained his father and late brother, Mick, to Cooma’s first A-grade circket title.
While there were many stories of greatness shared at the luncheon, Fry shared a not-so-glowing anecdote of how he ended his glittering football career.
“I played about 30 games for Rochester under Geoff Rosenow and was my first seconds game ever after coming back from a hamstring,” Fry said.
“It turned out to be the last game I played, but I wanted to stay involved, so I became the runner for Dirty (Dave Williams).”
Post his Rochester coaching career Williams took over as coach of Kyabram in 2008.
The Bombers had just avoided their first wooden spoon in 2007 and in the seven years Williams held the coaching reins he led the Bombers into three grand finals, winning the title in 2013, and missed just one finals series.
His seven-year tenure at the club was made famous because of the pack he coached without payment for the entire period.
Williams also coached Rochester for 16 years after an AFL career with Melbourne and Richmond and is a life member of both Kyabram and Rochester football netball clubs and a member of the GVL Hall Of Fame.
Stanhope legend Mick Auld, who captained the club’s 1992 premiership team, was also at the luncheon where the colours of a Colin Scott-trained racehorse were unveiled.
It will race in the yellow and black (complete with Tigers logo on the breast plate) and 10 per cent of all winnings will go toward the club.