Subiaco provide blueprint on building premiership teamWednesday, October 1, 2014 - 7:12 PM - by Chris Pike

SUBIACO'S golden era of four premierships and six grand finals in a seven-year stretch was never going to last forever, but the Lions have quickly rebuilt successfully to win the 2014 flag and lay the blueprint for the rest of the WAFL to follow.

Subiaco hadn’t won a premiership since 1988 despite some close calls throughout the 1990s and again in 2003, but what was to ensue was the club's greatest ever period in history.

There was the losing grand final of 2003 to West Perth followed by the 2004 premiership and then a disappointing preliminary final exit in 2005 following another strong season.

However, between 2006 and 2008 Subiaco dominated the WAFL winning its only ever premiership hat-trick and then finishing off that remarkable period with a grand final loss in 2009 to South Fremantle.

That era was ushered in by Peter German as coach and finished off by Scott Watters with a remarkable group of players along the way.

Allistair Pickett, Luke Newick, Mark Haynes, Darren Rumble, Chad Cossom and Marc Webb were there for the 2004, 2006, 2007 and 2008 premierships.

Ben Keevers, Brad Smith, Jarrad Schofield, Aidan Parker, Matt Priddis, Chris Hall, Ben Randall, Daniel Rich, Anthony Beattie, Sam Larkins, Shaun Hildebrandt, Caine Hayes, Chris Hood, Todd Holmes, Josh Wooden, David Mapleston, Blake Broadhurst, Rob Forrest and Greg Broughton were all multiple premiership-winning players as well.

That is a group of all-time great Subiaco and WAFL players but eventually they have to move on.

Hall, Haynes, Larkins and Schofield all played their last games in the winning grand final of 2008 before Smith, Mapleston, Hayes, Beattie, Daniel Chick, Simon White and Trent Dennis-Lane were among the departures at the end of 2009.

Webb and Newick then moved on in 2010, Cossom retired midway through 2011 and Pickett and Keevers hung in until the end of the 2011 season as well.

Subiaco was fully in the middle of a rebuild in 2011 under coach Chris Waterman and pulled off a surprise grand final appearance thanks to a stunning second half of the season.

While losing the grand final to Claremont in the finish, the signs were there that Subiaco had managed to complete a stunningly quick rebuild after one down year in 2010, but it wasn’t quite the case.

There were still senior players there in 2011 like Horsley, Randall, Forrest, Parker, Pickett, Adam Cockie, Hildebrandt, Des Headland, Rumble, Danny Hughes and Broadhurst, but the thing that now has significance is the strong group of now premiership players who earned a taste of a grand final.

Under Waterman, Jason Bristow, Scott Worthington, Chris Phelan, Brad Stevenson, Clancy Wheeler, Reece Blechynden and George Hampson cemented themselves as regular league players and all aside from Blechynden went on to become league premiership players in 2014.

All of those players will openly admit to having learned plenty from that grand final loss to Claremont and put that into practice in the 2014 grand final that the Lions won in style over East Perth by 16 points.

There were some hard times again in 2012 under Waterman with a seventh place finish with seven wins and then in 2013 under new coach, and former triple premiership player, Schofield there was an eighth place finish but last year with six wins might have been the most important season at all.

Brett Mahoney, Rhys Waters, Justin Joyce, Chris Deluca, Daniel Leishman, Ryan Wade and Simon Moore all received their chances in 2012 either as a recruit or young player and that proved to help set the 2014 premiership in motion with those players either there on grand final day in the league side or in the reserves pushing for selection.

Then in 2013, Andrew McDougall and Jarrod Kayler-Thomson were brought in as experienced recruits with McDougall going on to be a premiership player in 2014 and Kayler-Thomson only missing through injury.

More young players got their chances too including Charlie Le Fanu, Dylan Elliott, Dylan Clarke, Will Fetherstonhaugh, Kyle Halligan and Joel Ashman.

In Schofield's first year in charge as coach, he had some tough times with a long list of injuries but what he was able to work out was exactly which players still had enough left in the tank, which young players could be part of the success going forward and what he needed to recruit into the club.

He had those young players to build upon, but the recruiting was specific and targeted to the needs that Schofield had identified that Subiaco needed if it wanted to push up the ladder.

The first was some key forward targets and that's where Matt Boland and Lachlan Delahunty came as a double act.

Boland settled at full-forward and almost won a Bernie Naylor Medal while Delahunty proved a strong leading, marking and versatile centre half-forward, wingman or back-up ruckman.

Some ruck help for McDougall was then identified as a priority and Frank Stockley was signed from West Perth after missing the 2013 premiership with the Falcons but winning the Prendergast Medal as the best player in the reserves.

McDougall had a slow start to the year and he and Stockley didn’t play together until the preliminary and grand finals of 2014, but both were significant members of the premiership team.

Some premiership experience was also something that Subiaco was clearly without in 2013 despite then four-time premiership full-back Rumble playing on.

That was naturally helped with the return from the Gold Coast Suns of Horsley and also wingman Hildebrandt coming back from Swan Districts, but the signing of Wayde Twomey from Swans also proved a masterstroke as he settled into being the general for Subiaco across half-back in 2014.

Joel Latham was then another unheralded recruit who came after three years of nothing but reserves football with West Perth and had a terrific year with Subiaco either across half-back or a run-with player through the middle.

Shane Yarran was another surprise recruit who arrived at Subiaco and he had a tremendous season as a member of the potent forward-line alongside Boland, Delahunty, McDougall, Hampson, Waters, Josh Deluca and Chris Deluca.

With the continued development of young and emerging players along with those strong recruits and the continued growth of Bristow, Phelan, Hampson, Wheeler, Stevenson, Worthington and Leishman, and Subiaco showed just how to build a premiership team.