This article was published in Rugby News' grand final edition

Few people are more determined or have more reason to be at Leichhardt Oval on Saturday than Kate Brenac.

The Eastern Suburbs’ stalwart has had a rough trot with some health issues of late, but seems confident she’ll find a way to the rugby this weekend.

“I’m making every effort to get there,” Brenac told Rugby News during the week.

“I’ve put myself into hospital this week to get an oil change and some grease and I think I’ll be right by Saturday.”

Easts have been close to unbeatable this season and have the chance to win six of seven available Shute Shield premierships this weekend across the grade and colts competitions.

The Beasties first grade side can also break a 55-year title drought by beating Northern Suburbs in the main game on Saturday afternoon.

“I haven’t seen anything like it in my time and I’ve been involved with the club since 1959,” Brenac said.

“I’ve been to a few grand finals over the years but we haven’t won any for a very long time, so this one would be nice. “I took two of my children to the 1969 grand final at the Sportsground and my daughter who was three years old that day has three boys playing for Easts in the second, third and fourth grade grand finals.

“Those boys used to come down and ballboy when my youngest son Ed was playing first grade in the 2000s, so they’ve all been involved at the club all their lives.”

Brenac first ventured down to Woollahra Oval in the late 1950s when her older brother started playing colts.

“In those days, you had to play for the area that you lived in and fortunately for our family, that was Eastern Suburbs.

“If we lived a few streets the other way, he would have ended up at Randwick and that would have been just terrible.”

Brenac said she and her friends spent most winter weekends watching rugby at Woollahra and trying their best to sneak into the original clubhouse, Grimley Hall, which is now home to Woollahra Golf Club.

“We were all under 18 and there was a very strict general manager at the time. I was probably 16 or 17 and all we wanted to do was get into the club.

“They built this little shed out the back - it was probably an asbestos shed - called the Hut.

"We weren’t allowed in there on a Saturday night but we worked out, as teenagers do, that we could get in if we said we were having dinner.

“So we’d all go and have a mixed grill out the back and then one by one we’d try to drift into the club. But we never lasted long, Gordon Williamson was always one step ahead of us.”

A decade later, after getting married and with two kids in tow, Brenac watched on proudly as Eastern Suburbs beat Gordon 16-12 to win the first grade premiership for the first time in 22 years.

“All the boys we went down there to watch in colts had graduated in to grade by then and we were all still friends. There was Michael Rowles, Murray Fahey, Johnny Cox, all the boys who are life members with me.

“It was a massive day for Easts and there was a huge crowd there.

“I went home with the kids after the game but my husband went back to the clubhouse and I didn’t see him for a few days,” she joked.

After her kids began playing at Easts, Brenac got involved in the club’s administration at a time when it still wasn’t easy for women to do so and started the club’s very first juniors’ side in 1989.

“We only had minis at the time, there were no juniors and we went from the one team I started in 1989 to what is down there now.

“When we first started, they wouldn’t let women or kids into the old clubhouse with the pokies. So the other mums and I used to go down while the kids trained and have a BBQ, drink cask wine and sit on the balcony because we weren’t allowed inside.”

She later became the first female to join the Eastern Suburbs’ board and the first female life member of the club, but that didn’t occur without its challenges.

“When I was first nominated for the board, they said I couldn’t join because I was a female.

“I told them they knew I was a female and I’d been a female all my life and now we were standing at the AGM and they were telling me I couldn’t join.

“They said what do you want us to do and I said you need to change the constitution. It took a few years but we got there.

“When I got on the board, I told them, ‘I’ve got six kids, let’s get on with this meeting, I want to know what I need to do this week, then get off home.’

“They wanted to sit there having their sandwiches and beers and take three hours to work out who was cleaning the toilets.

“It was always a lot of fun though and the place has changed a lot over the years.”

Brenac’s youngest son Ed played over 100 games for Eastern Suburbs during a period of relative success through the 2000s, but Kate grew frustrated as the club’s first grade premiership drought dragged on.

“We’d get to grand finals or to preliminary finals and just couldn’t win them,” she recalled.

“I still remember that fellow Berrick Barnes kicking a field goal to beat us. It was terrible.

“At the time, everyone used to complain about Sydney Uni winning everything, but Uni organised themselves really well from 1989 onwards and they got the results.

“For a while, all we did was complain but I thought we needed to do something about it and we did. It’s taken us 20 years, but it looks like we’ve finally got there.

“The club is absolutely buzzing on and off the field and it’s a fantastic place to be at the moment.”

Kate will be busy on Saturday. Her son Ed is an assistant coach of Easts’ first grade side, while grandsons Will, Charlie and Tim (Nicholls) will play second, third and fourth grade respectively.

Brenac has watched Will and Tim win a second grade premiership before but after a 55- year wait, is desperate to watch the Beasties win the big one again.

After everything Kate has contributed to Sydney club rugby, you’d have to say she deserves it.