08-08-2025
Gurney clocks a triple century, showing no signs of slowing down
Meet Scott Gurney | ACT AFL Local Legend
Gurney clocks a triple century, showing no signs of slowing down
By James Buckley
Updated August 8 2025 - 10:16am, first published 10:15am
In partnership with Toyota
When Scott Gurney assumed his maiden post as a Canberra boundary umpire in 1994, it was the first time he'd ever witnessed a match of Australian rules football.
Fast forward three decades, the 56-year-old has now officiated in an estimated 800 games of football, and recently notched up a triple century of top-grade AFL Canberra matches.
"I grew up in Boorowa which is very much a league town, and the first game I watched of AFL was one that I umpired," Gurney said.
"I'd never ever watched a game, not even the grand final on TV. I knew absolutely nothing but I was a pretty good runner back in those days.
"I used to be a state-level squash player. I was doing a bit of cross-country running to supplement my squash, and a few of the guys I played with suggested I try umpiring because they'd done umpiring themselves.
"Back then they put an ad in the paper saying they were looking for umpires, come down to training on Tuesday night. My brother and I went and we thought 'boundary umpiring's all right, you don't get yelled at, there's plenty of running, you get paid'."
That first involvement in umpire training has reshaped Gurney's life.
He's since umpired at AFL level, had his own children who have pursued the craft and now oversees the next generation of boundary riders coming through the Canberra ranks.
"We get a lot of these 13, 14 years old, little scared kids coming in who want to try it, they thinking 'Am I going to get yelled at, can I do it, am I good enough?'," Gurney said.
"It's really their first job as well - they learn some really good life skills, the teamwork, responsibility, wearing uniform, following instructions, working under pressure so when they do go for a job you can give them a good reference and they've learned some of these really good skills.
Gurney clocks a triple century, showing no signs of slowing down
"It gives me great pride when I bump into some of these kids who are in their mid 40s who I coached back in the early 2000s and you can see they're confident adults.
"There's a great group in Canberra, we've got a great association, good people in key positions."
And Gurney has no intention to slow down - as an active umpire, or as a mentor.
Despite gruelling training sessions every Wednesday night - it's not uncommon for boundary umpires to run upwards of 15km during a single match - the role allows Gurney to remain in peak physical shape.
Even more importantly, Gurney is determined to continue training the next generation and believes increasing the amount of female participation is the next frontier.
"There's a ton of girls playing footy, you look through the draw and you can see how many girls are playing in the junior competitions and now there's three levels in the women's competition as well as the rising stars, the standard is really good, but what you don't see is that amount of umpires being female as well," Gurney said.
"We're making a bit of headway there, there's still a bit of work to be done not only in Canberra but also around the country. Here in Canberra, we've got female coordinators now so it's really good we come out with plans, and we're coming up with ways to better increase the female participation.
"We bring people in as boundary umpires because you don't need a lot of skill, you just need to be able to run and throw. The ones that are more confident or have the footy brain. . .we try to transition into junior field umpiring and we've had a fair bit of success with that.
"It's like we're a big family. In Canberra here the umpiring community is fantastic and in general the footy community is great, I have great relationships with all the clubs."
Discover more at Toyota's Good for Footy webpage.
This content has been produced in partnership with Toyota
