By Jonty Ralphsmith
Cranbourne has the chance to add another riveting chronicle to one of local football’s great modern dynasties.
Brandon Osborne will be looking to lead the club to back-to-back premierships for the first time since 1990-91 when his side takes on Cheltenham at RSEA Park, Moorabbin at 2.15pm on Saturday.
Defending a flag is about the only thing left for this squad to achieve, having reigned supreme for so long.
Collectively, Cranbourne and Cheltenham are 60-8 against all other teams in the Southern Football Netball League Division 1 competition across 2022-23.
Cranbourne’s arrival to the competition has inaugurated a great rivalry with Cheltenham, which leads the head-to-head between the teams 4-3 in the last two seasons.
But under coach Steve O’Brien, Cranbourne has won two of the three finals between the clubs, seizing its moments late in last year’s grand final and the 2023 second semi final two weeks ago.
The team is led well by a seasoned core whose careers have encompassed an overdose of September experience.
In 2010, the arrival of bookends Marc Holt and Brandon Osborne strapped a sense of optimism onto a proud club.
The following year, the group delivered the club its first flag for 16 years, an undefeated season establishing itself as a generation capable of going big.
“I don’t want to win a flag one year and do nothing the next,” said then coach Doug Koop at the time, while stopping short of generating expectation akin to the eminence of the late 1980s-early ‘90s.
A Saturday premiership would put these resilient Eagles alongside the great successes produced by the club in the late 20th century.
Four premierships from nine grand finals in a 14-year, 12-season period is the clearest indication of culture unleashing a period of on-field excellence for a club.
It isn’t a case of the stars aligning to allow a list with optimal talent to ratify on potential and talent.
Rather, the habit of winning is an intangible that has been microchipped into the Eagles’ guernsey.
Justin Berry was the gun midfielder in the 2011 premiership, starring all day, before producing a late moment of magic to seal the result for his team.
Finals are about moments and Zak Roscoe, Jarryd Barker, Nick Darbyshire and Bailey Buntine are among the names who have already delivered this year.
Only five players – the Osborne boys, Marc Holt, Ryan Jones and Michael Boland – from that 2011 flag will battle for a flag to add another triumphant anecdote to the era they started.
The baton has been well and truly handed over and three different coaches have overseen the domination.
A strong and well-resourced junior program has continued to foster local luminaries, allowing them to look inward to remain in contention for flags year after year.
The seven flags of the late 20th century came in a dense period where a squad, united by mateship, came together to conquest local footy.
Cranbourne has continued to back that insular plucky mentality, which is organically passed on to allow the legacy to continue to grow.
Other clubs look outward to bring in starpower to propel them to a flag, but there is no substitute for team chemistry.
Last year against Cheltenham, it was the bottom six players which won the Eagles the premiership.
When they needed to go, they did unflinchingly.
Playing on RSEA Park, the same dimensions as their home base, brings out the best in them.
The blades of grass must have by now developed a crush on Nick Darbyshire as he uses the expanses to his advantage.
Darbyshire won a premiership in just his second game of senior footy and will be gunning for his third, among 10 players with multiple club premierships already to their name who will likely lineup on Saturday.
Opposition clubs must look on at the winger in equal awe, for the ground is suddenly suppressed to feel like JL Murphy Reserve, Port Melbourne when they get the ball, given how quickly they are pounced upon by Osborne’s men.
It’s poetic that several clubs have left Livingston Reserve after a loss this season commenting on the firmness of the surface.
September is about hardness which is the pillar Cranbourne is built upon.
The Rosellas were so well aware of Cranbourne’s toughness and grit that they sought out an extra big-body in Luke Verma to match it with the Eagles on the big stage.
Des Ryan’s side has proven that if you let up for any period of time, you will be punished.
Cranbourne has seen it, lapsing for barely 10 minutes at Jack Barker in round 13, which saw Ryan’s side pile on three match-winning goals.
Cranbourne is well aware of the position that the Rosellas find themselves in.
Having been frontrunners in four consecutive years from 2012 but falling short in the grand final, the Eagles will be looking to consign the Rosellas to a similar fate.
