The Danihers: The story of football’s favourite family

On 1 September 1990, four brothers made Australian Rules history by playing together for the one team, the Essendon Football Club, something that is unlikely to ever happen again.

Terry, Neale, Anthony and Chris Daniher grew up in a tiny Riverina town where they played footy on Saturdays and Rugby League after mass on Sundays. They reached the elite level in an era when tobacco sponsorship and a few beers with the opposition after a game were the norm. It was a time when Jim Daniher could throw a teenage son into a trade deal and Kevin Sheedy and Edna Daniher could conspire to make a dream come true. But it wasn’t all plain sailing: injuries cut short a promising career, trading between clubs was largely unregulated, the Swans were shunted off to Sydney and coaching changed dramatically.

This is an action-packed story of the period when the national Aussie Rules competition emerged and football became big business, and an unassuming bunch of blokes from the bush endeared themselves to footy fans and became part of football folklore.