A N INTRIGUING mixture of fate and forward planning have come together to change the life of Sydney school boy Chris Ogle — and might one day prove a master stroke also by his new club the Western Bulldogs.
But most of all the decision by the Bulldogs, who will later this week announce they have rookie-listed Ogle as their first successful product under the NSW scholarship scheme, is a success story for the AFL in its slow and stealthy creep into Sydney's private schools where rugby union has ruled for the best part of a century.
Less than three years ago Ogle had no interest in Australian rules football. He was one of those 15-year-old school boys who had made a success of pretty much every sport he had attempted, although interestingly not golf — the sport that made his father Brett Ogle famous and still does via Fox Sports and its golf coverage.
"Dad called me the snake killer on the golf course," said the 18-year-old Ogle yesterday from the Sydney home he will soon be leaving.
"I'd play for a few weeks and then stop. I guess I've always preferred team sports."
The Bulldogs' decision to commit to Ogle will also change the fortune of the teenager's family.
Having just completed his exams at Scots College in Bellevue Hill, Ogle has lived primarily in Sydney with his mother Maggie and 15-year-old sister Rachel, but will now live with father Brett and step-mother Ricki at their home in Melbourne's south-eastern suburbs. Chris has not lived in Melbourne since he was eight, and even then it was only for one year.
"My mum will stay there in Sydney," he said, "and all of this will be the toughest on her really because I've been pretty much the man of the house and to leave them behind will be pretty hard. She's not much of an AFL fan but neither is my step-mother."
Brett, a Hawthorn supporter despite his NSW origins, has remained very much behind the scenes during his son's surprising journey although he developed a relationship with Bulldogs coach Rodney Eade during Eade's years at Sydney.
The forward planning part of Ogle's story came via the scholarship scheme that the AFL introduced two seasons ago and Ogle knew nothing about.
"I grew up playing rugby union," he said, "and then in 2006 they started a fun Friday night AFL competition and then from that I made a junior rep team and our coach David Beauchamp was a recruiter for the Bulldogs.
"We played in an exhibition game before the Sydney-Fremantle preliminary final that year and I played at full-back which suited me because I was a rugby full-back.
"Although I struggled skill-wise I think they noticed I had some pace and was pretty fit. I loved the space and being able to run as far as I wanted."
On Beauchamp's recommendation, Ogle was taken by the Bulldogs as their one experiment under the scholarship scheme and he began to spend significant parts of his school holidays training at the Whitten Oval, giving up rugby union and cricket at school, which was a source of tension at Scots.
Ogle struggled with injury for most of 2008 and there were many times he wondered whether sacrificing the traditional school colours pursued by his friends, and previously by him, had been worth it. He had received athletics colours in year 10 but missed another set when he chose to travel to Melbourne with the NSW/ACT Rams for the under-18 championships only to miss out on the team and instead carry drinks on and off the MCG.
"It was a bit of a battle at school," said Ogle, "missing Saturday sport to work on my AFL skills and Scots weren't happy with how the AFL were coming in and taking their kids.
"But now it all seems worth it. Even missing out on an athletics carnival was worth it to run water on and off the MCG."
Ogle remains a long-term project at the Bulldogs. He will not resume full training until next year because of upcoming shoulder surgery and he admits he is still learning to read the play and has some way to still travel in skill development.
However it has been Ogle's work ethic, positive attitude and remarkable fitness and athletic ability which has lifted him across the line according to Bulldogs recruiter Simon Dalrymple. It was Dalrymple who told Ogle he had been taken as a rookie after an astounding performance at last month's AFL draft camp.
Ogle visited the Canberra camp for less than a day with a group of fellow NSW scholarship holders for skin fold and beep testing.
On the latter he managed an impressive 15.7 — breaking the record set by Jarrad McVeigh.
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