Bacchus Marsh coach Dennis Armfield will reunite with his former Carlton teammate Zach Tuohy after getting the Irishman to the Ballarat Football League club for 2025.
The Cobras announced on Friday night that Tuohy, who finished his AFL career after 288 games at the end of 2024, had joined the club.
When Tuohy announced his retirement, Armfield reached out to see what his mate was planning to do this year.
“He always knew that I would have a conversation with him when he retired,” he said. “He’s a close mate.
“He’s come on board and for us, he’s a great recruit for the club and the community in terms of the development of the young boys.
“It’s really exciting that I have a great mate that is playing under me.”
Armfield said he wasn’t sure how many clubs had spoken to Touhy about him joining them this year.
He said it was a different experience for the AFL premiership player, who has never played local football before having come to the AFL from Ireland.
“Knowing Zach, he wanted to play with a mate,” he said. “I wasn’t sure if he was going to play at all.
“We have been mates for 10 plus years. It’s exciting for him and he gets to buy into the local sporting community in Australia.”
Armfield said there had been a massive reaction to Tuohy joining the club since the announcement with many in the playing group and at the club Geelong supporters.
“Hopefully this will build some more momentum for the club,” Armfield said.
The signing of Touhy is the club’s biggest off season signing so far.
Nic Dunshea has crossed from South Adelaide in the South Australian National Football League in the other signing announcement from the club.
Armfield said he was a utility and something they were missing last season.
He said they had looked to lock in their existing playing group before adding additional pieces.
“Outside of retirements, of our key signings we only lost one or two players,” he said.
“We’ve had a couple of others return to the club. We have two or three more that will potentially come across.
“They are good young talent from other competitions.”
The Cobras still have plenty of growth to come from the existing playing group.
Nine players are currently at Coates Talent League sides’ Western Jets and Greater Western Victorian Rebels, while seven players spent time at Victorian Football League clubs during the summer.
Armfield said they know they still have plenty of work ahead of them.
“We are long way off,” he said. “We didn’t finish last year how we wanted to and didn’t get the results we were after.
“The competition will get better and we have to improve a lot.
“We have to knuckle down and do the hard work over the next couple of months to attack the season.”
