Growing up, a young Tanner Bruhn used to sit in the Players Stand at the Moorabool Street end of GMHBA Stadium. 

A long-time club member who idolised Andrew Mackie, Bruhn would pick the number 4 guernsey when years later he would land at the Cats after a 2022 trade with the Giants, and on Saturday night, he will line up for his 50th AFL game back where it all started.

In many ways, he seemed destined to end up on the other side of the fence playing for his beloved Cats.  But with the rapid growth of the national competition, the romance of playing for the team they grew up barracking for has become a rare commodity for the modern player, and as is the case with so many aspiring footballers, Bruhn would need to head interstate to chase his footy dream.

In those early days, the Bruhn name was a familiar one in the close-knit community of Geelong football. Dad, Matt won the 1996 Mathieson Medal for Grovedale in the GFL and is an inaugural member of the Geelong Falcons, where Tanner himself, a budding football prospect, would end up before the Giants of Western Sydney would swoop on the talented youngster at the 2020 AFL draft. 

It led to what became one of the first AFL draft moments that went semi-viral when a seemingly sombre-faced Bruhn stood up to be hugged by family members after his name was called by the Giants with the 12th pick. 

Bruhn himself would later explain he had a reserved personality and was simply in shock at officially becoming an AFL player. 

Whatever the case, the Cats would be watching from afar, as were a few other Victorian teams, and he would debut for the Giants just 102 days after being drafted.

Bruhn has regularly said how much he enjoyed his time in Sydney, he talks about the friends he’s made and how grateful he was for the club for giving him the opportunity to play football, but the pull of Geelong, and being close to family, was always strong. 

“I think it was a good opportunity for me and I’d been thinking about it a little bit throughout the season,” Bruhn told SEN’s The Run Home last year. 

“It popped up probably a little bit late, but it was a good time and opportunity for me to come back.”

It certainly didn’t hurt to have a sympathetic ear in Geelong captain Patrick Dangerfield, a Moggs Creek local, who had been drafted to Adelaide in 2007 and eventually made his own way back to the Surf Coast region.

“I caught up with Patty (Dangerfield) a couple of times for a coffee,” Bruhn told SEN.

“We spoke about different things, he’d obviously been through a similar thing moving from Adelaide.

“He gave me his advice and I just thought it was the right decision for me and I was pretty keen to come home.

“To come to a club like Geelong who have been so successful was awesome and they were happy to have me.”

When the call did come from then Geelong List Manager Andrew Mackie, confirming the deal had been done to bring him home, he was in a hospital with his sister who had just had a knee reconstruction. It was not so subtle reminder of the importance of having family close, and why the decision to come home was, in the end, a simple one.

“For me, the opportunity arose, and I thought if I could get the chance to go back to family and friends and join such a successful club like Geelong, why not take it?

“I loved the Giants and my two years up there, but I really want to try and make the most of my career and I think like that could be at Geelong surrounded by my family, friends and loved ones.”

Now, the story that started as the little boy in the Players Stand dressed in Cats kit will come full circle when he runs out under lights against St.Kilda, the team he debuted against back in 2021. 

According to Bruhn, it’ll be another ‘pinch me’ moment, in a career already full of them, but an extra special one under the bright lights of GMHBA Stadium and in the iconic Hoops.

“I'm on the other side of the fence now, which is a bit weird. I was just down there in the Player's Stand, so I used to see it all. It's different and it's exciting. 

“I look around and think I used to be on the other side of the fence.”

Who says dreams don’t come true?