Australian Football

When the Brown’s Well Football League disbanded after the 1968 football season its four member clubs, Alawoona, Peebinga, Taplan and United Ramblers amalgamated to form a single new club, which in 1969 fielded two teams, Brown’s Well and Brown’s Well II, in the Upper Murray B Grade Football League. The first choice side was successful in claiming the premiership that season after it defeated Loxton in the grand final by 19 points, 8.6 (54) to 4.11 (35).

The 1971 season saw the UMFL B Grade competition effectively replaced by the Riverland Independent Football League, in which both Brown’s Well and Brown’s Well II competed side by side for the next five years., with Brown’s Well contesting four out of five grand finals during that time for two wins.

At the end of the 1975 season Brown’s Well II disbanded, but the Bombers’ senior grade side continues to compete in the RIFL to this day. By the turn of the century they had contested no fewer than16 grand finals and won eight premierships, but the early years of the 21st century proved to be more of a struggle, culminating in the ultimate indignity of a winless wooden spoon in 2008. Fortunes after that were mixed but in 2015 the Bombers reached a long overdue grand final only to go down to Lyrup by 26 points. A year later they made amends with a 19.8 (122) to 8.5 (53) grand final trouncing of Ramco, a result which gave them their tenth senior grade flag. The 2017 season saw them add to that tally when they accounted for the grand final challenge of Paringa with scores of 10.8 (68) to 5.9 (39). A year later, however, they suffered a slump in form which saw them miss the finals entirely with their tally of 6 wins and a draw from 14 minor round matches only proving good enough for fifth place. The 2019 season brought a further decline in fortune as the Bombers dropped to sixth place on the eight tem premiership ladder. There was no senior football in 2020 owing to the coronavirus pandemic.