Sport
6 August, 2026
CAN HE DO IT?
TWO GAMES and 19 goals is all that stands between Lachie Sharp and the Loddon Valley football goal kicking record.
TWO GAMES and 19 goals is all that stands between Lachie Sharp and the Loddon Valley football goal kicking record.
A mercurial performance by the Bridgewater coach last Saturday had him bagging a mammoth 25 goals against Mitiamo.
He came close to the all-time match record of 29 set in 2003 but the bigger accolade is within reach.
If not this week against Calivil, then maybe, just maybe, in the final home and season meeting with Macorna will the record set by Marong’s Brandyn Grenfell of 143 in 2022 be broken.
And one former champion goalkicker, who holds a different Loddon Valley mark unlikely ever to be broken, reckons Sharp pass the season record easily.
Greg Gadsden, holder of the match record and himself a former goal centurion when playing for Bears Lagoon Serpentine, says Sharp is odds-on for the main record.
In the past six games Sharp has kicked 69 goals at an average of 11.5 a match.
Earlier in the year, Sharp kicked eight goals against the Calivil and seven in a shock loss to Macorna in his quest for a second century in two years.
But given the rich vein of form he is in – with 37 goals in the past fortnight – few would bet against him managing the 19 goals before the finals.
“It’s one of those things you take as it comes,” Sharp said of the record, insisting that he was only thinking about team ambitions, with a premiership to be won, and not individual accolades. Not one bit, to be honest – we have bigger and better things to worry about.”
Gadsden this looked back on the 2003 when scarcely believing that the century mark was within reach against a struggling Dunolly side..
“It was pretty surreal,” Gadsden recalled. “We kicked 72 goals for the day, and you had to take into account that Dunolly was not travelling very well at that time.
“I never thought about the century before the game – if memory serves me right, I needed eight in the last quarter, and that was when my teammates probably started trying to find me.”
The Bears’ 72.24 (456) was the fifth highest score in Australian football on record – Dunolly kicked just 0.1 in return.
Gadsden finished with 121 goals that season, including seven in the finals.
The record for a season counting finals is 162 by Bridgewater’s Peter Collins in 1982, with 140 of those coming in the home and away matches.
Sharp, with a minimum of four games remaining, needs 38 goals to surpass Collins’ full season mark.
Gadsden is in no doubt that Sharp will break the Grenfell record this year.
“I would think he would do it quite comfortably, no disrespect to Calivil or Macorna,” Gadsden said.
“He will get plenty of opportunities - eight to 10 goals in both games – it’s not out of the question by any means,” was the prediction from Gadsden.
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