Australian Football

Essendon Reserves

Essendon first fielded a reserve team in the VFL between 2000 and 2002 after which it entered into an alignment deal with the Bendigo whereby Bendigo altered its nickname from Diggers to Bombers and adopted a similar black with red sash playing jumper to that of its parent club. Essendon players not selected to play in the AFL could be chosen to play for Bendigo. In terms of on-field performance the arrangement was not particularly successful with the Bombers never finishing higher than fourth and collecting a wooden spoon in 2009.

Since 2013 Essendon has again fielded its own reserves team in the VFL playing its home matches at the club's traditional base of Windy Hill. In 2016 the Bombers won 10 out of 18 home and away matches to qualify for the finals in eighth place. They then scored an upset elimination final win over Geelong Reserves but in the following week's semi final found eventual premiers Footscray too hot to handle and went down by 19 points. A year later their season came to an end at the elimination final stage when they lost by 5 points to Footscray. This was followed by an improved showing during a 2018 season which ended at the preliminary final stage with an 8 point loss to Casey Demons.