Hey, Hey, It's The Bullets!
15/10/2009

After 10 months in the rec footy wilderness, The Bullets make their return to the Box Hill Recreational Football League for the 2009 season. But it doesn't end there! After several months of negotiations, The Bullets will also be competing at this year's Australian Corporate Games in Melbourne in November.

The BHRFL takes a slightly different look this year, with the competition reduced from a 6-team format to an elite 4-team format. The Bullets return to the competition alongside the AFLVIC All-Stars (who have scored an early coup by recruiting Fitzroy legend Leon Harris), along with the addition of two new franchises: The Melbourne University Mugars (an all-female side who are multi-time premiers in the Victorian Women's Football League) and Rod's Rebels (who are financially backed by paper magnate Rod Taylor). Plus, the competition has a new president, with Shawn Wilkey stepping up to the role vacated by Matthew Weerden at the end of the 2008 season.

The Corporate Games will see The Bullets playing against fellow corporate giants such as ANZ Bank, Mattel, and GM Holden. The one-day only round robin event looms as perhaps the toughest test for The Bullets to date.

Warren 'Coachy' Burford returns for his sixth year at the helm. He has been written off so many times in his career that it would be foolish to do so again. After concluding the 2008 season in style, there is a quiet confidence among both coach and players that 2009 could see The Bullets achieve their first-ever top four finish.

But they will have do so without 13-game veteran and 2005's Best First Year Player Margit Gailis, who once again takes a sabbatical from the game. In happier news, Brent Jones has been elevated from the rookie list and has gained a permanent place on the senior list, while his bad-boy brother Dean Jones returns from the crippling finger injury that saw him miss the entire 2008 season.