West Warrnambool's Luke Gannon gearing up for 300th game

The long-time Panther, who has played only with the Davidson Oval-based club barring a short stint coaching Merrivale, will reach the major milestone in Saturday's division two clash against Wesley-Yambuk.

Gannon's multi-decade career is still presenting new opportunities.

He's been able to line up alongside 13-year-old son Brock in the club's seconds this season and his milestone match will come at Yambuk, a ground he's never set foot on.

"School mates got me here. I went to school at St Pius and Mum and Dad's house is literally a golf shot from Davidson Oval," Gannon said.

"A couple of mates of mine, Corey McDonald and Dan Haberfield, I went to school with them and they were playing a bit of outdoor cricket and I was playing a bit of indoor cricket.

"They got me to come along to training and the rest is really history."

Gannon had a year off after his time leading Warrnambool and District Cricket Association rival Merrivale but some solo coaching with Panthers wicketkeeper Ryan Youl and division two skipper Mark 'Sooty' McLean opened the door for a return to West.

He said the chance to play division two and help usher through the next generation, combined with playing alongside old mates, was a winning combination.

The year off also helped rejuvenate a love of the game, Gannon said.

"That was probably one of the big factors, I'm good mates with Sooty and he was captain of the twos. There's a pretty good batch of young kids that are all sort of on the verge of getting into the ones," Gannon said.

"That's sort of been the role I've played with Sooty this year and in previous years, try to help them get up into the top division.

"Hopefully we can help them stay there. There's probably five or six in our current division two side that've had some kind of exposure to the ones and they're not that far off becoming a permanent fixture."

Gannon, also dad to Beau, 11, and Marley, 9, said the chance to take the field with Brock in recent weeks had been a boon.

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While Brock is a promising youngster, Gannon said the speed of his rise had caught him by surprise.

"He got a bit of a fill-in game a couple of weeks ago, bowled all right and has been in there with me since," Gannon said. "It was always the grand plan to play with him at some point but I didn't think it'd be this soon. Even looking around the side I play with, I've played with five or six of their fathers as well.

"I'm starting to feel it a bit but you see these kids grow up and then you start to play with them and tell stories about playing with their fathers and things like that."

The focus from here? Helping West's twos push for a finals appearance. The Panthers will sew up a spot in the gold conference's post-season with a win on Saturday.

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