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HORSHAMCurrent Affiliation: Wimmera Football League (WFL) since 1937 Colours: Maroon and blue Emblem: Demons Senior WFL Premierships: 1938, 1960, 1962, 1967-8, 1970, 1972, 1974, 1976, 1979, 1981-2, 1989-90, 2003-4-5-6-7-8-9-10 (22 total) The Demons can lay claim to being one of Victorian country football’s truly great clubs, a status their recent spectacular sequence of success has only served to reinforce. Since the Wimmera Football League was reconstituted in 1937 the club’s senior grade side has won non fewer than twenty premierships, which is almost twice as many as its nearest rival, Ararat, which has claimed eleven. The Demons’ run of six successive grand final triumphs between 2003 and 2008 is also a league record, beating Ararat’s four in a row from 1955 to 1958. Football in Horsham dates back at least as far as the 1870s when a team representative of the town engaged in scratch matches against various local opponents. When the Wimmera District Football Association was formed in 1902 Horsham Football Club was one of three inaugural members. The club enjoyed a fair amount of success in this competition, which went by a number of different names over the years, and which in 1934, when it was known as the Wimmera District Football League, was merged with the Ballarat Football League to form the Ballarat Wimmera Football League. This competition comprised eight clubs, four each from Ballarat and the Wimmera. For the Wimmera clubs it presented a stern challenge, as the standard of football was somewhat higher than they had been used to. However, Horsham in particular made light of the transition, and over the three season period that the BWFL was in existence enjoyed the third best record in the competition. In 1934 the team made it to the grand final, where it lost to South Ballarat by 58 points. Overall, Horsham managed a success rate in the BWFL of 52.9%, compared to 42.7% for Stawell, 41.2% for Warracknabeal, and 30.0% for Ararat. The 1937 season saw the BWFL splitting, with the four former WDFL clubs joining with Dimboola, Jeparit, Minyip, Murtoa and Nhill from the Mid Wimmera Football League to form the Wimmera Football League. Horsham’s first premiership in this competition came in its second season thanks to a grand final victory over Stawell, but there then followed an atypically prolonged period of under-achievement, which was not brought to an end until 1960. The 1960s proved to be an excellent decade for the Demons, who claimed a total of four senior grade premierships. However, the ensuing decade was even better, as the Dees went top in 1970, 1972, 1974, 1976 and 1979. Their dominance continued into the 1980s, which produced another three senior grade flags, although the club also endured its share of disappointments. In 1985, for example, the Demons won every match for the season leading up to their grand final clash with Dimboola, only to produce an inexplicably limp performance, and lose. Horsham commenced the 1990s in ideal fashion by procuring the 1990 premiership, but there then followed a long period of ‘outs’, which lasted until 2003. Since then, however, as mentioned above, the club has enjoyed unprecedented success, with the seniors claiming six flags in succession, the reserves finishing top in 2004, and the thirds in both 2003 and 2008. Over the six seasons the seniors lost only half a dozen matches, out of a total of 108 played. Coach Stuart Farr and full forward David Johns managed to play in all six of the Demons’ winning grand finals, with Johns amassing in excess of 600 goals over the period. The club’s excellent junior development programme has been a major contributory factor to the club’s success, with coach Farr declaring "We don’t have to hunt too hard for players, they just keep coming up through the ranks each year, which is fantastic". Few therefore would have been surprised at the Demons' continued dominance of the competition which yielded further premierships in 2009 and 2010. Whether this dominance is good for football in the Wimmera is a matter for debate, but all things considered it seems hard to imagine it ending any time soon. Where now? or
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