John Worsfold’s first experience as a Bomber came well before being appointed the Head Coach.

It was a 17-year-old Worsfold who would spend two weeks training at Windy Hill under the watchful eye of then Coach Kevin Sheedy.

The Bombers had just come off their back-to-back premiership wins against the Hawks and were looking to start preparing the next generation of players.

“I’d just finished playing under 19s in the WAFL and wanted to have an experience to see where I sat and what I could learn and get better at,” Worsfold said.

“It was via my South Fremantle manager. He touched base with Kevin Sheedy and they invited me to train for two weeks.”

Even at such a young age, Worsfold was a highly decorated player in the Western Australian league.

In his first year of playing senior football for South Fremantle, Worsfold was awarded the ‘Rookie of the Year’ and ‘Best First Year Player’ in 1986 to go along with the ‘Player of the Future’ award he collected in 1985.

Although he caught the eyes of the Essendon selectors, Worsfold would remain in Western Australia to join the inaugural West Coast Eagles team as they entered the competition in 1986.

Worsfold would make his AFL debut in 1987 and go on to play 209 games and captain the team to two premierships in 1992 and 1994.

Although he would never play with the Bombers, Worsfold remembers his two weeks at the Bombers fondly.

He is grateful for the opportunity presented to him by Sheedy and praised the vision the coach had to expand his search for the most talented players.

“A lot of clubs were reluctant to say 'let’s mess up our program by letting these snotty nose kids run around with us’,” Worsfold said.

“I had that opportunity which was brilliant.”