So addictive was the euphoric feeling when the final siren sounded at Moama Recreation Reserve last year, the Tigers have again been chasing it all season long, and on Saturday at 2:30pm, they will get the chance to play for it once more.
“Yeah, absolutely (we are thrilled),” Cobram coach Mark Meyland said.
“I think after coming off a grand final win last year, you sort of set the standard that you want to be there again to contend and give yourself the opportunity to go back-to-back.
“So, we’re pretty happy that we’re in this position to give it a run on the weekend.”
That contest last year against Congupna will forever be remembered as one of the great Murray league deciders, with the Tigers holding off a fast finishing Road side that was left to rue inaccuracy, as Cobram claimed a famous 8.6 (54) to 5.21 (51) victory.
It has proved a precursor to what is rapidly developing into one of the best rivalries in country football.
The combined winning margin across the past two contests between the pair has been only 10 points, with the spoils split, though the most recent clash — the second semi-final — saw The Road win straight through and book the first of the grand final slots.
While it has forced the Tigers to go the long way ahead of this Saturday, playing a preliminary final against Nathalia at the weekend to qualify, Meyland believes the extra game heading into the decider could actually benefit his group.
“It's a bit of a blessing in disguise, I think,” he said.
“Obviously you’d love to win and get yourself guaranteed into a grand final.
“But as far as keeping yourself match fit and giving a couple of guys an opportunity to run into a bit more form, it’s worked out pretty well considering the fact that we got the win and we got some more minutes into a few guys that were probably a little bit underdone.”
If the past 12 months are anything to go by, Saturday’s clash will be yet another classic instalment between the two.
So evenly matched are the two sides that there is not a distinct game style or statistic likely to favour one massively over the other, though with a full list to choose from, Meyland does identify his midfield group as potentially having a slight edge, which could see the Tigers get over the line.
“I think we're very evenly matched,” he said.
“When we look at the Premier Data stats, we’re pretty well spot on in every area of the graph.
“But on the weekend, we’re probably reliant heavily on our midfield brigade.
“We’ve got a great ruckman in Jackson Trengove and back-up in Corey Pearse, and we feel like that’s a little bit of an edge for us.
“Then we’ve got a great midfield, Perry Lewis-Smith didn’t play last time we played (Congupna) in the semi-final, so he’ll be back in the mix, and he’s one of our couple of best players, and so he’s going to add a lot more power to our system.
“We sort of feel like we’ve got a really good mix of talents in our midfield that can hold us in great stead.”
With so much history between the pair in such a short space of time, Meyland said his group knows what it is up against come Saturday, and his final message at training on Thursday night will be reflective of that.
“I think it’s just internal belief, and we feel like we’ve already got that belief anyway,” he said.
“It’s just controlling what we can control, being up for the fight, and I think it’s going to be the main thing.
“Like you said earlier, every time we play them, it’s a pretty tight contest.
“We’ve got to expect that it’s going to go the full 120 minutes, and just allow ourselves to be in a position to hopefully get the win at the end of it.”
The first bounce of the grand final is at 2.30pm at Moama Recreation Reserve.
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