New Fox Footy documentary goes behind the scenes of one of footy’s most unlikely premierships — Essendon of 1993

TIM Watson’s comeback to Essendon ended in a premiership. But when it was first ticked off, not everyone was rapt to have him back, including champion ruckman Paul Salmon. Get the inside story.

Tim Watson returned to help Essendon win the premiership in 1993.

PAUL Salmon has revealed he didn’t want Tim Watson to come out of retirement on the eve of a 1993 season Essendon would end with a fairytale premiership.

New documentary, 28 Games — Rise of the Baby Bombers, airs on Fox Footy on Tuesday night with Salmon admitting he believed Watson had no place in a new-look Essendon line-up.

“I didn’t really want him back. My space at that time was it is a new leaf, it’s a new team,” Salmon said.

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“It’s ‘Bomber’s (Mark Thompson) team, it’s my team, it’s (Mark) Harvey’s team, (Gary) O’Donnell. So I had my reservations.

“(But) If you ask me now … I would say it’s one of the great things that happened to that team in that year.

“Tim’s presence around the group, his leadership and the sort of person he was, I underestimated how much our young guys idolised him. Where he’d been my teammate for 10-11 years, these young players, he was a God to them.”

Tim Watson returned to help Essendon win the premiership in 1993.

Watson said: “I sought counsel with a number of different people and people I really respected.

“I spoke to Bruce McAvaney at that time, who I’d started working with at Channel 7, and he said, ‘Don’t do it’. So I went in search of people who said yes.”

In an entertaining and enlightening one-hour look behind the scenes of Kevin Sheedy’s baby Bombers, several of the major players in one of Essendon’s most memorable flags recall:

SHEEDY’S Tiananmen Square speech before the semi-final against West Coast.

DEREK Kickett’s controversial omission from the Grand Final team.

MARK Thompson’s mid-season declaration of love for his teammates.

THE drawing that inspired the Dons’ staggering 42-point half-time preliminary final comeback against Adelaide.

“He drew a head in the top left corner of the whiteboard … and he said, ‘This is the Adelaide Crows and they’d be feeling pretty good about themselves … they probably think they’ve got this game won’,” Salmon said.

Michael Long and Paul Salmon celebrate a goal in the 1993 Grand Final.

“Then he drew a line … and a circle in the bottom right hand corner and that was us. He said ‘What are you thinking boys? You’ve got 75,000 people at this game, 70,000 of them barracking for you. You’re seven goals down with an hour to play’.

“This is what you should be thinking: ‘You get the first two goals of the third quarter, get 70,000 people behind you and you’ve got a 19th man. You’re (then) five goals down with 50 minutes to play’.

“He said: ‘Winnable’. He just engendered this belief.”

Kickett remains one of the biggest selection stories in Grand Final history after he was dropped despite playing 23 games that year, including all three finals.

“I clearly recall that when we played against Carlton in the night (qualifying) final, we went out for the three-quarter time huddle and Derek had been taken off the ground and he stayed on the bench,” Watson recalled.

“Kevin mentioned his name during that address and I remember him looking around and he couldn’t find him and then she saw him on the bench. In his own mind, maybe he (Sheedy) marked his card then.”

28 Games — Rise of the Baby Bombers

Fox Footy

Tuesday, 9pm

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