COUNTRYFOOTYSCORES.COM

 The Tigers have not only employed brothers to lead their team, but the men in question are also twins.

Classic country boys who love a beer and a chat, Chris and Leigh Walsh arrived at Simpson last year and with their give-it-all approach on the field and friendliness off it, quickly won over the club's many passionate supporters.

"They're terrific blokes, they really know how to enjoy themselves," said Simpson president Brad Mason. "Coaching together wouldn't work in a lot of other situations. There were some people who said 'It's not going to work', but for these two, it's perfect."

Now the Tigers are hoping the twins can usher in some more glory days, like those of the early 1990s, when premierships — and rain — were in plentiful supply.

The brothers grew up in nearby Cobden, which sits in the heart of western Victoria's dairy farming region.

Inseparable then, as now — "We ring each other five or six times a day," Chris said — they quickly made an impression on the footy field. By their late teens, both were in the local seniors.

They were members of Cobden's 1997 premiership in the powerful Hampden league, though both missed the Bombers' '98 flag — Chris through injury and Leigh dropped to the reserves.

Many more games in red-and-black followed, and the thought of becoming senior coaches never crossed their minds. Nor did leaving Cobden.

However, in late 2007, after Simpson had managed just one win for the season, then-president Greg Rooke made the Walsh twins the focus of his campaign to find a new coach.

It took much persuasion, but Rooke eventually won out. The twins agreed to start travelling 24 kilometres south from bustling Cobden, population 1500, to the hamlet of Simpson, population 200, to play their footy.

And true to form, they signed on as a package deal.

"Just the enthusiasm (Rooke and officials) showed to want to get their club up and going again won us over," said Chris. "It was now or never for us because we were in our early 30s, so we thought we'd give it a crack.

"We'd coached juniors at Cobden in the under-18s," added Leigh. "We thought if we're both going down there, we might as well coach together."

Remarkably, there were no clashes over roles and responsibilities.

"We sorted that out pretty quick," Leigh said. "I wasn't real keen on speaking out on the ground so I said, 'I'll do the pre-match stuff'. Chris did the rest."

Although the brothers are not identical twins, their new teammates had trouble telling them apart during the initial weeks of pre-season training. "They kept getting us mixed up," joked Chris. "They'd just call us 'mate' half the time."

As the year progressed, the umpires in the Colac and District league had the same problem. "They kept giving me votes he should've got," admitted Chris.

In 2008, the pair guided Simpson to three wins from 18 games — a more than respectable performance given the Tigers fielded a very youthful side.

This season, the boys, now 33, are counting on a return of at least six victories. Their team is more settled, although they did spend much of the summer chasing recruits.

By targeting fringe players at their former club, Leigh and Chris even found themselves tangling with older brother Wayne, who is in his third year as non-playing senior coach at Cobden.

"We don't tell him who we're chasing!" said Leigh. "Some family functions get a bit heated, but that's all right."

Eight days ago, Simpson kicked off its 2009 campaign at home to South Colac.

As the brothers fired up their troops in the tin shed that is the Tigers' changerooms, their wives minded their ever-growing clan of children.

"Between us, we'll have six between us by August, all aged under three," said Chris' pregnant wife Brooke.

It is the partners who best sum up how the twins cope with the stress of coaching and still remain close mates.

"I've never really known them to fight, apart from when they were teenagers," said Leigh's wife Sarah. "Their whole lives revolve around footy — for 12 months a year."

"They are complete opposites," added Brooke. "Chris is the stress-head. He's been nervous since five o'clock this morning about the game. Whereas Leigh's easy-going. He's probably hardly thought about it."

When the players ran out, some typical south-west weather set in, with steady drizzle falling, though the ground was in immaculate condition.

"We had a big drainage system put in about 15 years ago," Rooke pointed out. "She used to be knee-deep mud out there. The young blokes don't know how lucky they are."

Changing between the midfield and forward line, the Walsh boys won their share of the ball as Simpson opened a four-goal lead by half-time.

With broad shoulders and a solid build, Chris played a bullocking style of game, while Leigh, wiry but strong, provided some dash.

The Tigers failed to go on with it, despite passionate speeches from Chris at the breaks.

South Colac's bigger bodies proved the difference, as the Kangaroos booted 10 goals to four in the second half to run out 14-point winners.

"Would've been great to win that one," Mason mused as he walked across the oval after the final siren. "The boys had put in so much work — training camps and stuff like that."

Back in the tin shed, tape hanging from his shoulders, Leigh took his turn to address the team, delivering an initial tirade about many players' lack of fitness.

But he also found plenty of positives in the effort. The Tigers, he said, would be competitive with most sides in the Colac league this year.

The many dairy farmers watching on slowly shuffled out of the shed to go and milk their cows, before returning for the after-match function.

The looks on their faces told Leigh the pressure to succeed will mount in the coming weeks.

"They'll be real disappointed," he said. "They get pretty eager."

Holding his young son, Chris wandered over to work out the award winners.

As is their way, the twins quickly came to an agreement and moved on to the next task — enjoying a beer and a yarn