In Jim Main's series, 'Swan Songs', this week he talks to former courageous Swans centreman Bernie Evans...

Bernie Evans
Born: August 20, 1957
Played: 1978-85
Games: 148
Goals: 212

Although Bernie Evans was born and raised in South Melbourne and wore the red and white with tremendous distinction from 1978, he had to make a momentous decision in the lead-up to the 1986 season.

Incoming coach Tom Hafey declared that all Swan players had to live and train in Sydney and Evans had just secured a long-awaited position as a tally clerk on Melbourne’s wharves.

Evans felt he had to secure his work future and reluctantly told the Swans he could not make the shift to Sydney. After being wooed by Carlton, Collingwood, Footscray and Hawthorn, he signed with the Blues and spent three seasons at Princes Park.

Although Evans barracked for the Swans as a boy, he played his junior football with VFA (now VFL) club Port Melbourne, progressing through the ranks to play in the Borough’s 1977 senior premiership side.

The Swans made the finals that season and coach Ian Stewart invited Evans to train at the Lake Oval with a view to joining South the following season.

The 19-year-old Evans made the move seamlessly, taking out a prestigious newspaper award as the best first-year player of 1978.

Evans played every game that season and won immediate recognition as a highly-skilled rover or centreman with a knack for goals. He also became a firm favourite with Swan fans because of his courage and cheeky ability to upset the opposition.

Evans even shifted to Sydney after the club relocated to the harbour city in 1982, but returned to Melbourne when he secured his tally clerk position.

But he was not alone as Barry Round, Billy Picken and others returned to Melbourne and trained under reserves coach Peter Hogan at the Lake Oval.

Evans won the Swans’ best and fairest as a “fly-in” player in 1984, with ruckman Steve Taubert the runner-up. Ironically, however, Taubert finished fourth in the Brownlow Medal that year.

Now the Swans’ ruck coach, Taubert has never allowed Evans to forget this anomaly. “He is mighty proud of his Brownlow effort in 1984, but I got the best and fairest,” Evans chuckled.

While Evans headed for Carlton in 1986, the Swans embarked on a massive recruiting drive under the ownership of Dr Geoffrey Edelsten and signed Geelong’s Greg Williams, Bernard Toohey and David Bolton, Melbourne’s Gerard Healy and Essendon’s Merv Neagle, among others.

“It would have been fantastic to have played alongside Williams and company and not doing so is something I regret,” Evans confessed. “I also wonder about what might have been if the Swans had been able to retain all our players over this era as David Rhys-Jones also went to Carlton and David Ackerly went to North Melbourne.

“I still believe the Swans could have won a premiership over the 1986-87 seasons if they had been able to keep all their players.”

Evans might have been reluctant to leave the Swans, but he almost played in a Carlton premiership side in 1987, missing out through suspension.

Evans had been reported for striking Hawthorn ruckman Greg Dear in the second semi-final and although he expected to be cleared, was found guilty and suspended one match - the Grand Final.

“It was only a glancing blow,” Evans recalled. “And Dear even told the Tribunal that he milked the situation to get a free kick, and missing out on playing in a premiership side was a real kick in the guts.”

Evans retired at the end of the 1988 season and his only later involvement in football was as an assistant to Tom Alvin when his former Carlton teammate coached VFA (now VFL) club Sandringham for a couple of seasons.

Evans, who now runs a contract cleaning business in conjunction with a one-third interest in the Cricketers’ Arms hotel in Port Melbourne, remains a dedicated Swans’ supporter and gets to as many games and functions as possible.

He and wife Terese raised three daughters - Haley (now 28), Indya (23) and Bianca (21) - and his loyalty to the Swans is reflected when he jokes that he was unable to produce a father-son prospect for the Swans.