Coach Tom Couch and his match committee made the easy decision to recall their in-form big man from a hamstring complaint, but the tough decision to drop youngster Tyran Mansell for the grand final.

Lee will resume charge in the ruck but Couch said Lewis Hollmer would be there to lend vital support, having played his best game as the main man in the preliminary final.

The Northern Bombers have chosen not to discuss last year’s loss to Glenorchy but instead to embrace this occasions for what it is – the club’s fourth successive appearance on the season’s final day.

North has spent a lot of time on the training track of late after having the first week off, winning through and then another spell to think about what might be.

STRONG CULTURE: Northern Bombers have grown into a powerhouse 

But Couch is confident his side is ready to grab the cup with both hands.

“Last week we just worried about ourselves on the track and focused on areas that we need execute well on the weekend… then went down and had a look on the weekend [Lauderdale v Launceston] and now it’s about Lauderdale and what we need to do to combat them,” he said.

“We’re very lucky that we’ve got a squad of 30 that have been training once the DLs lost in the second week of the finals.

“We’ve been pushing ourselves, we haven’t been holding back… [and] we’ve been training on UTAS too, which is handy.”

North has won two of its three encounters against the Southern Bombers this season and he isn’t expecting any surprises from Darren Winter.

“Their top end’s very good and they’ve got some good depth as well. I really rate [Ryan] Wiggins as a player he’s a great target, [Nat] Franklin’s really clean – they’ve got some really good options across the board,” Couch said. “[Josh] McGuinness is a really good defender, reads the ball really well.”

Couch, who played in eight grand finals in 10 years earlier in his career, said he is expecting a physical battle.

“You try and tell the players that they [grand finals] don’t come around too often, but for a few of them it does,” he said.

NORTH’S FAMILY HISTORY: Connor Young and Rhyan Mansell 

“You’ve just got to enjoy it. We’re going to have eight players playing their first grand final for the club and that’s exciting.

“You’ve got players there that want to make a name for themselves, but you’ve also got the experienced heads that have done it before.

“They run the footy club, the leaders, they set the standards, their attitude and behaviours are great and we don’t do anything without consulting them.”

“YOU can’t win the game if you come second to the ball”.

Lauderdale coach Darren Winter has demanded his side be more physical come Saturday’s decider with the Southern Bombers looking for a 20-goal turnaround against North Launceston from their 94-point second-semi final thrashing two weeks ago.

Ruckman Toutai Havea and Jordon Roberts, the only Southern Bombers player to have played in a senior grand final, have been selected to return from suspension and injury respectively. Forcing Winter to leave out Campbell Hooker and Sam Adams for a match that is expected to be played out in wet conditions.

Lauderdale will carry the underdogs tag into its maiden TSL grand final despite being the only side to defeat the Northern Bombers at UTAS Stadium this season – albeit by one point.

Winter said the mood had been more upbeat around the club this week after knocking out Launceston.

“The club was on a bit of a high after [the opening final win against Clarence] and we probably didn’t reset quick enough and focus on the next game – we won’t make the same mistake again,” he said.

“We’ll be a lot more physical this time, all the way through the finals series we’ve probably played too far back from the edge of where we needed to be, we’ve focused on not getting reports and being undisciplined.

“That will be freed up in the grand final and there will be a lot more aggression at the ball and at the opposition when they have the ball.”

Winter said North stars such as Jay Lockhart, Taylor Whitford, Tom Couch, Tom Bennett and co could expect some close attention.

“They’ve got players we’re going to have to stop, we’ll probably go in with two or three tags maybe even four tags to try and shut down their run,” he said.

“If they don’t pay us the same respect back then we’ve got guys that will get hold of them and we can certainly turn the result around from the second-semi final really quickly. 

“We know we can score quick and our game is very fast and furious. If they let a couple of our guys off the hook we’ll get hold of them, no mistake about that.

“We’ve got to be mindful that we don’t be too defensive but we’ll certainly go into the game with some lockdowns to try and curve their influence.”

Winter said a Lauderdale victory would justify the club’s decision, which has often been questioned, to enter the State League in 2009.

“We copped a lot of flack at the start of it, [people] saying that we were out of our depth, and we probably were at the start. If we can retain our youth and people in our zone then we can certainly take on the big boys,” he said.