The Maitland Pickers open age team needed to win their five last competition games simply to qualify for the semi-finals.
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Win them they did and they hope now to extend their amazing winning run to nine and claim an unexpected 2019 premiership against Western Suburbs at McDonald Jones Stadium on Sunday.
Pickers open age captain-coach Luke Mercer remembers clearly the message in discussions with his troops with five games left in the season.
"We broke it down to five individual weeks, five games left before the finals," Mercer said this week
"We thought we had to win three to four games to put us in good stead to make the finals. As it turned out with other results not falling our way we had to win all five.
"We won our last five competition games to make the finals and squeeze into fifth. And then to win every final to make the grand final is a massive achievement.
"We broke it down week by week and in that time we got a bit of consistency with the same players on the roster each week.
"The last eight games we've sort of had the same core of the team, which really helped us.
"In the early part of the season when there were so many injuries at the club we had so many changes each week with having to help out with reserve grade.
"Some of the boys were playing two games a week, playing for us and then backing up for reserve grade.
"That led to injuries as players were getting knocked about by playing a couple of games every week.
"We had some under-19s coming up. It's a bit of a juggling act but everyone has to do it at that level."
Mercer is in his fifth season as a playing coach after two years at the helm of East Maitland in A-grade, two years as Maitland reserve coach and this year at open age with his mates.
"I played the year before last in first grade, just concentrating on playing and after that I thought I'd have the one hurrah with my mates," he said.
"My goal at the start of the year was to try and get a couple of blokes back playing at the club who I had played with over the years.
"A last hurrah with a couple of mates has turned into an chance for us to hopefully win a premiership now."
Mercer said the entire team was just enjoying the run and was full of self-belief.
"Every final we have taken the attitude that there is no pressure on us. We just scraped in but we've got a real self-belief and are on a roll at the moment," he said.
"Kurri came second and we beat them 34-0. We completed something like 92 per cent in the first half. If we can find that form we had last week and bring it into the grand final we have real shot at winning."
The grand final team will be announced at captain's run at the Maitland Sportsground on Saturday. Players will be presented their jerseys by former Pickers first grade premiership coach Trevor Ott and premiership players PJ Ellis and Joel Osborne.