Ken Piesse runs through his favourite players from the Hampden area.

Football's changing face often sees on-ballers amassing 30 possessions and more these days. Gary Ablett jnr had 38 a few weeks back for Geelong and still his coach wasn't satisfied!

When I first started following VFL footy in the early ‘60s, anyone who managed 20 possessions had had a day out and if you happened to get 30 you were guaranteed the three Brownlow votes.

Until the mid-‘60s and the advent of Harry Beitzel's Footy Week magazine -- old issues which I still have now -- statistics were rarely kept, so the best days for the likes of ball magnets like Bobby Skilton, Ian Stewart and Co. went mainly unrecorded.

Geelong was ahead of the rest even back then and in Alistair Lord, one of the club's star twins from Port Campbell, it had a silky-skilled ballwinner who simply intimidated his opponents with his possession count.

Winner of the 1962 Brownlow Medal by a runaway nine votes and one of my early footy heroes as a result, Lord regularly had 30 kicks a game back in 1962-63, his two mega years. In his Brownlow year he also won ‘The Lindy', then awarded annually as Australian football's leading player for the calendar year.

Lord is my favorite all-time player from the Hampden League and I still wonder why he didn't make Geelong's Team of the Century back.

"The year I won the Brownlow (with a whopping 28 votes) and the year afterwards, too (1963) I was in a corridor I couldn't see out of," Lord told me. "I was so focused, so entrenched in the game, I wouldn't have known if the siren had gone."

Lord and his twin brother Stewart (also a brilliant player) had been boarders at Geelong College before playing a season at Cobden in the Hampden League, Alistair at centre-half forward and Stewart as a ruck-rover.

After playing three games on permit at Geelong (in 1959), they both had to return to Cobden after the country club refused to clear them, an extraordinary circumstance even then.
After his solo success in 1962 - he also won virtually every major media award -- Lord says he was targeted in 1963 and was lucky to even play in the '63 Grand Final after being flattened by Essendon toughman Ian "Bluey" Shelton late in the year.
"Come Grand Final week my AC joint was still sore and I hadn't played for a month. But I was desperate to play. Prior to selection on the Thursday night, (coach) Bob Davis trying to bump me and I said to him, ‘Not too hard Bob. I want to play!' "

Lord still loves to see the Cats at home, especially the master playmakers like Ablett jnr., Joel Selwood and Jimmy Bartel.

He says with luck the Cats could have won three flags in a row, but for their poor kicking in the 2008 play-off with Hawthorn.

Asked about his exclusion from Geelong's top 25 players in 2001, he says he has "moved on", but it has still left a huge scar, especially for his family. After-all he played eight years and 122 games with the Cats and still lives within a couple of booming Doug Wade torpedoes from the ground.

"I have great memories of my playing days," he said.

"I played in a great era with great mates, playing for a very great club."

Lord is my all-time "favorite" player from the Hampden way, but he was pushed all the way, especially by a couple of veterans who I also had the privilege to interview Don Grossman, "Mr Football" of the south-west and Dickie Harris, the Richmond and Williamstown goalsneak renowned for his booming torpedoes and a nickname of "Hungry" which Kevin Bartlett inherited!

Terang legend Wayne Reicha is also right up there having played almost 350 games... all at the same club. Few have matched his courage or self belief, at any level.

My favorite top 10 from Hampden way, in alphabetical order are:

Jonathan Brown: Three AFL premierships before his 24th birthday and from the toughest position of all centre-half forward are undeniable proof of his flair, skill and credentials as the AFL's greatest player since Wayne Carey and Robert Harvey.

John Devine: Known as "Colac", where Geelong recruited him from, Devine was the toughest and most unrelenting Geelong player of the early ‘60s. Later in the mid ‘80s, he returned as senior coach. Few could deliver a "spray" quite like John!

Don Grossman: A ruckman in the infamous bloodbath Grand Final between South Melbourne and Carlton in 1945 before he trebled his weekly salary by accepting 10 pounds a week to be playing-coach at Warrnambool in 1948, Grossman was the leading footballing figure in Warrnambool for years. He had a decade with Warrnambool and arch rivals South Warrnambool and also played 100s of matches with district clubs too, followed by secretarial and media work, administration and even a history of the Hampden League; a true legend.

Dickie Harris: Played in a premiership in his first year out of the bush (1934) and was part of Richmond's 1943 flag team too, kicking seven goals in the "Grannie". Was originally from Warrnambool where he learnt to kick humming torpedoes off one step. Jack Dyer told me once if Dickie had the ball within 40 yards of goal, no matter the angle, he'd walk back to the centre for the next bounce, so sure was he that it would be a goal!

Jordan Lewis: I admit to a little bias here. I've loved Hawthorn since I was little and Lewis plays a no-nonsense old-time style of footy I like but doesn't always sit as happily with umpires and the tribunal! At 24, his best is yet to come, yet he has already played in a premiership team and last year had more than 500 possessions, proof than he can get it just about as often as anyone. Ex-Warrnambool.

Alistair Lord: A super-classy midfielder eight up there with the greats of his time including Ian Stewart (St Kilda), Jack Clarke (Essendon) and another country boy in Brendan Edwards (Hawthorn). Had five years as Cobden's captain in the mid to late ‘70s.

Kevin Neale: One of the best-ever from South Warrnambool, ‘The Cowboy' played in three Grand Finals for St Kilda including the club's only premiership in 1966, when he kicked five of the best. And he's happy to talk about all five, too - again and again! Is one of the game's great characters.

John Rantall: Won interstate selection in 1963 after just eight games of League football and in all played 18 seasons and more than 300 games, the majority at South Melbourne. Was the Hampden League's best and fairest at Under 18 level in 1961 as a 17-year-old and a champion even then. Is Cobden's most decorated Big League player.

Wayne Reicha: Holds the Hampden League's record of 342 games including 50 finals, 10 Grand Finals, three premierships and two senior best and fairests, all at Terang. He is a truly inspirational figure given that he was born deaf, with no ears, no outer canals and was paralysed on the right side of the face. Twenty-two operations later, he was able to lead a reasonably normal life, all his ops being successful except for his ears, his skin rejecting the plastic moulds.

Colin Watson: Originally from South Warrnambool, where he was best afield in the 1919 local Grand Final, Watson was encouraged to go to the Big Smoke by the club's coach Roy Cazaly and in a dream season in 1925, was voted best afield in nine of his 15 matches to win the Brownlow Medal, a particularly meritorious achievement as St Kilda didn't even make the top four that year. He returned to the bush as South's captain-coach in 1929 before being lured back to the city again after seven years in the bush.

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF KEN'S FAVOURITE TOP TEN FROM HAMPDEN?

WHO ARE YOUR FAVOURITES?

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By Ken Piesse

Article first appeared vcfl.com.au 17 May, 2010