Analysis: Country footy’s most even and uneven leagues
The numbers have been crunched for country footy’s closest and most uncompetitive leagues. See which leagues came out on top.
Hampden has soared to top billing as the Victoria’s most competitive country footy league at the halfway mark of 2025 with round 10 indicative of how even the competition has become.
A fortnight ago, the southwest’s major league witnessed second-bottom team Cobden defeat the premiers of the last two seasons, South Warrnambool and finals contender Terang-Mortlake suffer a shock loss to out-of-contention Camperdown.
Hampden was ranked outside the top-10 most even leagues at the end of last year based on the average winning margin of matches data collated by the countryfootyscores.com.au website.
But in the opening nine rounds there has been an improvement of more than two goals per game with 2024 wooden-spooner Portland’s resurgence helping the improvement.
Portland is in finals contention only two years after contemplating a return to the Western Border league.
Gippsland was the most even league at the end of 2024, but has tumbled outside the top-10 with averaging winning margins blowing out from 28.39 to 46.38 points in the first half of 2025.
Central Highlands, Ballarat and Wimmera have broken into the top-10 since the end of last season.
Golden Rivers has also forced its way into the top-10 despite a recommendation that it could be closed down at the end of the season.
Geelong District and Sunraysia remain in the top-five most competitive leagues compared to the same stage last year.
The most uneven league in the state is the four-team Upper Murray league with average winning margins of 20-plus goals with Corryong having only one match this season not decided by more than 100 points.
North Central experienced the biggest change to margins with an increase of almost 50 points per match.
Long-serving Koroit coach Chris McLaren’s club said there had been a noticeable tightening across the Hampden league since the pre-Covid era when the top-three teams “were a fair way ahead of everybody else”.
“The comp is probably as even as I’ve seen it,” he said.
“North was undefeated on top until Saturday and is a good side.
“But they’re not smacking anyone and (bottom-placed) Hamilton might have only won one game, but haven’t been getting thumped.”
McLaren said the league experienced a drain of players to the Geelong league pre-Covid due to the perception Hampden was dominated by a handful of clubs.
Geelong’s average winning margins have blown out from the end of 2024 to midway through this season by almost two goals per game to 80.05 points.
“It’s now completely flipped,” McLaren said.
“You can also get a substantial jump if your best players are available.
“There aren’t games where you can just rock up and win like in the past.
“We think if we can get our best players available we could still be right in it.”
A big gulf has developed in the North Central league between the three bottom-placed teams, Donald, St Arnaud and Charlton, and the rest of the competition.
Undefeated Birchip-Watchem, Calder United and Sea Lake-Nandaly all had percentages of more than 300 at one point in the first half of the season.
Birchip-Watchem is in the hardest part of the draw with a string of games against Sea Lake-Nandaly, Calder United, Wedderburn and Boort before entering finals with matches against the bottom three teams.
First-year coach Ash Connick said how Birchip-Watchem tackled its last three matches to ensure it was well prepared for a successful finals assault would be dealt with closer to the time.
“We’ll be trying to do everything we can as well as we can and deal with that sort of stuff when we get to it,” he said.
“It’s highly likely we will finish top-two and we’re going to have that run of three teams who are very much trying to rebuild and then have the week off.
“There is good and bad in everything.
“I don’t think there is any ideal preparation.
“You just do what you think is right and roll with the punches.
“Birchip might have even had a bye in the last round last year, then had the week off, then won the second semi by two points, then a week off and then the grand final.
“It might be a blessing, but it also might be something we need to look at.”
Last season Connick co-coached Sandhurst to the flag in the Bendigo league which was the most uneven major league in the state last year.
Bendigo’s average winning margins have improved from 81.12 points at the end of 2024 to 54.46.
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