We are okay without Ballarat's interleague footy of old

Where the game sits right now, at country and national level, we are okay without it.

The state of origin debate tends to spark the same ponderings and reminiscing about representative footy from the AFL good ol' days every time the NRL brings its showcase into our football heartland.

At a regional level, the rumblings start again about now for interleague weekend. Ballarat Football Netball League will put up an under-23 team against the Warrnambool-based Hampden league in Warrnambool on July 6.

The senior version and the need to definitively rank the state's best football leagues has run out of steam.

What was once so great does not feel so sorely missed in a post-pandemic lockdown world.

This column has long championed for chances and pathways for players to take their games to the highest levels they could. The same goes for coaches and umpires.

Interleague football has long been a great tool to allow this and is also why is remains an important junior fixture. In AFL under-18 talent league terms, Vic Country selection for the Greater Western Victoria Rebels is a chance to step up their games under even greater scouting scrutiny and pressure.

For senior footballers, interleague has been a test to line up and train alongside the competition's best against a bunch of players outside your usual sphere of play. It was like that in the AFL too.

Interleague has largely lost its spark amid grassroots scrambles to field full teams at all levels.

But is great to see leagues persist in adopting an under-23 bout.

Fourteen years ago, a 21-year-old Redan premiership player Isaac Smith had his first taste of interleague football. At the time he quipped that with seven Redan teammates in the mix, it would probably feel like a regular Lions game.

Smith's efforts were awarded a call-up to the Australian Country Football Championships, representing Victoria even though he hailed from just across the NSW border.

At the Lions' encouragement, Smith joined the city's Victorian Football League team North Ballarat Roosters mid-season and by September he had become a VFL premiership player and AFL draftee to Hawthorn.

This does not mean interleague was the catalyst to Smith's AFL call-up but it was an added chance to showcase and challenge his game.

Just because such pathways might not be as clear now, does not mean they do not exist.

While there may not be the roll-call of the BFNL headline acts like there used to in interleague, AFL Victoria has added star power in coaching.

Three-time Brisbane Lions premiership forward and hometown hero Jonathan Brown is at the Hampden helm and Carlton great Anthony Koutoufides is coaching Ballarat.

This adds interest for fans but can be a masterclass for players.

In this sense, country interleague still offers a chance for promising young players to learn from experience and take a new perspective on their own game.

Interleague might still be about gathering a league's most talented young players for exhibition but any time a player challenges their game, this can only help benefit their club with the lessons they learn.