SHAYNE Breuer will coach the Wimmera Football League’s interleague team when it comes up against the Bellarine Football League in 2018.
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The appointment was confirmed at the league’s general meeting on Monday evening.
Breuer said it was a great honour just to be asked to coach the side.
“It will be great to be involved with all the top players from around the league,” he said.
“It’s a great opportunity for the players and for myself.”
League chief commissioner Trevor Albrecht said he was rapt with the appointment.
“It’s great to be able to have somebody with AFL experience and who has already coached in the Wimmera,” he said.
“He has great respect throughout the league so it’s exciting to have him come on board as coach.”
Breuer played 71 games with Geelong in the 1994, ‘95 and ‘96 seasons before joining Port Adelaide in its inaugural 1997 season.
He famously kicked the side’s first goal in the AFL and went on on to play 54 games for the club over a three year period.
After finishing his AFL career Breuer returned to the Wimmera and coached Kalkee to the Horsham District Football League grand final in 2007.
In November 2013 he took on a role as the coach of the Ballarat Rebels under-16 development squad and became the senior coach at the Horsham Saints prior to the 2014 Wimmera Football League season.
He coached the side to the grand final in his first season before going back to back with the club in 2015 and 2016 before stepping down from the role.
Breuer takes over from John Delahunty who has led the Wimmera league’s side for the past two seasons.
“We were rapt with the job that John has done and it was just that family circumstances that meant he could not continue with the job,” Albrecht said.
“We still hope that we’ll be able to sneak John in as a player. His experience is obviously terrific.”
The Wimmera league side will host Bellarine on May 19.
Breuer said representative football remains important in the region.
“You start to flush out the guys that love playing footy,” he said.
“You’re not playing for money or for anything else, you’re just playing the best possible competition you can.
It’s great to see how you go against guys from other clubs and your friendship group expands as well which is fantastic.”
Breuer has joined back up with the Horsham Saints for 2018 as an assistant coach and he said that initially made him hesitant about taking on the role.
“When Trevor rang to ask me I wanted a couple of weeks to discuss it with my family,” he said.
“I had to work out how I was going to fit everything in.
“But I knew that if I had a go at it I would be giving it a really good dip to do it really well.”