Good memory: Wayne Hamilton said umpiring the GVL vs MPFL interleague game at the MCG was one of his favourites. Photo: Ray Sizer
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Ray Sizer
An umpiring career spanning almost three decades will be celebrated on Saturday afternoon, with Wayne Hamilton marking his 600th Goulburn Valley Football Umpires Association game.
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The milestone marks years of dedication to football in the region, with the 53-year-old Kialla man beginning his umpiring journey in 1993.
“It’s really good and rewarding to achieve that sort of milestone,” Hamilton said.
“I was a field umpire before this, I’ve probably done about 25 goals and I suppose 575 central.”
Hamilton made the move to goal umpiring after undergoing two knee operations, and despite this and the COVID-19 pandemic, he has kept coming back.
“It’s just being around people, it’s a pretty good bunch of people down at the umpires,” he said.
“The scary bit is I’ve probably been through two generations of them (other umpires) now but I just keep coming back, trying to keep a bit of fitness as well."
Hamilton started his umpiring career in Hamilton as part of the Western Districts Umpire Association before moving to the Goulburn Valley.
Hailing from a family of umpires, he explained that his father umpired around 1000 games, his oldest brother umpired 1000 games and another brother is currently closing in on 700 games, while his nephews are also involved.
“After Saturday I’m probably about six games away from doing 900, that’s all my games where I’ve originally come from and the games here and everything, I’ve kept a tally,” he said.
“I’d like to get to 1000 games but that might take me another five or six years to get there and then we’ll see how we go from there.”
Since his arrival in the Goulburn Valley he has umpired five Goulburn Valley League grand finals, five Murray Football League grand finals and four Kyabram District League grand finals along with countless other games.
Throughout this time he has seen an incredible amount of talent go through the ranks, with the umpire highlighting a couple of players who stood out during his time in the middle.
“Robbie Miller from Rochester, he was a very good footballer to watch and umpire,” he said.
Milestone man: Wayne Hamilton walks out for his 500th game in the middle between the Shepparton Swans and Echuca.
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"There was Phillip ‘Toot’ Morgan and then there was a bloke that basically came straight out of the AFL, Craig Sholl and went to Echuca.
“Then you’ve got blokes like Stephen Ash who played for Shepparton so there was some really good footballers over the years that I’ve seen so it’s probably going to be a little bit hard to remember them all."
Awarded the GVFUA’s highest honour, the Ian Coates Award, in 2001, the man affectionately known as “Hammo” was elected as a life member of the GVFUA in 2008.
“I’m sort of quite proud of what I’ve done,” he said.
“If I’m being quite honest I sort of just umpire now to keep involved in the sport and the thing was we were a bit short of goal umpires, we’re even short this week.”
This weekend Hamilton will be the goal umpire in the GVL’s top-of-the-table clash between Euroa and Echuca.
“It’s good to be doing that game,” he said.
“I haven’t had Euroa this year but I’ve had Echuca and every time I’ve had Echuca they’ve impressed so it will be good to see both sides of the coin now.”
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