No coach in the colourful history of the Australian Club Championship knows more about what it will take to win the trophy in Sydney on Saturday than Bond University's Mick Heenan.
The decorated club mentor is a major ace up the sleeve for the Bull Sharks and it started a week ago with a warm-up trial against the Hunter Wildfires in Coffs Harbour.
Getting familiar with the different style of game played by Shute Shield clubs is invaluable.
Just how valuable, we will all discover on Saturday afternoon when the Bull Sharks meet the Warringah Rats at Pittwater Rugby Park on Sydney's northern beaches.
This will be Heenan's sixth quest for the Australian Club Championship which is the annual stoush between Queensland's club premiers and their Sydney counterparts.
Heenan won just once in five attempts with his vaunted University of Queensland sides and that was the singular time his team had home patch advantage in 2011.
"There is a lot of excitement for this game, a new experience, and we are down here to win it. We are not bothered by the history that says away teams don't win, " Heenan said.
"The Shute Shield sides do play a different type of game. It's more forward orientated. The players are typically bigger and more about the set piece.
"We also know Warringah have some big outside backs with some good offloading skills in the wide channels.
"Those UQ teams won it just once in five attempts so we know it is a difficult task to win in Sydney. We have a good mindset and we will be attacking the game."
No Brisbane club has won the Australian Club Championship in Sydney since Andrew Walker's heroics in 2009 stirred a major Easts comeback to topple Sydney University 38-31.
The rare triumphs in Sydney by Brisbane clubs have been hard won.
In 1985, a wild midweek match under lights at Coogee Oval is still recalled by all who played in it. Captains Tony Shaw (Brothers) and John Maxwell (Randwick) ripped into each other as the alpha forwards they always were for their champion clubs.
When the referee called them out and told them bluntly that the crowd hadn’t come to see them fight but to watch rugby, they hooked into each other again. The ref stunned both sides by sending off the two captains.
Brothers won 10-6.
In 1987, the champion Souths side of that era won 13-10 over Parramatta in Sydney. It was notable for Souths prop Dan Crowley appearing in the winning team photo in a newspaper the following day when his identity was being kept secret at that time while he worked as an undercover cop in the Brisbane drug trade.
All this made last weekend's visit to Coffs Harbour a shrewd move by the Bull Sharks. A 31-26 warm-up win was secured over a big, physical, feisty Wildfires side.
The Bull Sharks will lean on a confident core of players who stormed through the finals series last year and will again be a favourite for the 2026 Sumo Energy Hospital Cup.
Halves Liam Daniela and Luke Depiazzi and strong-running inside centre Tyler Campbell will give the side direction.
Queensland Reds attacker Heremaia Murray is a big "in" at fullback.
In the pack, flanker Kohan Herbert will be a major asset in his first big outing since leaving Souths. The industrious flanker will be at No.7 while Willy Rua, the former UQ captain, will play at No.8.
Campbell gives a good insight into what the club's rise has meant.
"This is obviously a 'first' for Bond to play in an Australian Club Championship," Campbell said.
"Winning our first grand final last year was pretty emotional. In the time that followed, I appreciated the journeys a lot of the players had taken to get there.
"I've seen the highs and lows myself from junior team days on the Gold Coast.
"That makes it pretty special to play this game on Saturday, experience it and do everything to win it.
"It's great that we have the Bond women's team playing for their own Australian Club Championship before us (against Warringah)."
The Bull Sharks women have been boosted by the availability of influential forwards Lucy Thorpe and Paris Mohr.
In the backs, halfback Evie Sampson is a key figure in the team's best attacking plays.
Both Australian Club Championship matches will be broadcast live on Stan Sport with the women's match from 2:15pm Qld time and the men's match from 3:40pm Qld time.
