Jayne Davies has high hopes on Saturday

Jayne Davies has held aloft many cups on the trotting track during her hugely successful training career. This weekend, the massive Collingwood fan is hoping her beloved Magpies will do the same on the MCG.

The Clyde horsewoman, a long-time Collingwood cheer squad member, said she would be at the ground cheering on the Pies in Saturday’s AFL decider after watching the team’s preliminary final win against Richmond on Friday night.

“At half-time we were all just looking at each other – we were in shock, we couldn’t believe what we were doing to them, the reigning premiers, you know,” Davies said.

“It was a big thrill, that’s for sure. But (this week) isn’t going to be easy (as West Coast) are a great side, it is going to take a mighty effort.”

Davies’ connection to Collingwood is made even stronger by the fact she has trained several horses part-owned by former champion player and present coach Nathan Buckley.

She said the pair, who have raced the likes of All I Can Be, Hurricane Jett (named after Buckley’s son Jett) and Stone of Destiny (with captain Scott Pendlebury), connected through an unlikely phone call – which meant Davies took some convincing she was actually talking to him.

“One of my owners was playing in a charity game at (Crown) casino, we’re going back 20 years ago or so, and I had always been a Collingwood supporter and he rang me and said ‘I’m sitting next to one of your idols, Nathan Buckley’,” she said.

“I said ‘oh yeah’ and he put him on. I thought it was a joke. So Bucks was talking away and I said ‘it’s not really Bucks is it’ and he was saying ‘yes it is’.

“He was asking about the horses and said ‘I wouldn’t mind getting a share in one, I will give you a call tomorrow’.

“I thought it was one big joke. The next morning he did ring me, we got talking, I realised it was him and I met him. I said I have a little two-year-old here (Hurricane Jett) that I owned and he was rapt to (buy) into him.”

Davies said she had been a cheer squad member for “a long time” and often travelled with the group interstate.

“I have made a lot of friends; there’s a group of us, we went to Perth and we sit behind old Joffa,” she said.

“He is a nice guy who does a lot for charity that people don’t realise. He is very passionate. Bucks calls Eddie ‘Joffa in a suit’.”

Regardless of the Grand Final result, Davies will be looking to make the weekend a winning one at Cranbourne trots, where she is racing four horses – Baccarat and Melchoir in the Hyland Harness Colours, British General (Seelite Windows & Doors Pace) and Magical Times (Decron Cranbourne Pacing Cup Sat 27 October Pace).

She said last start winner Melchoir was her best hope.

“He is going really well; I couldn’t believe his odds last start, he was $34 in the paper, as he was always going to be in the trail and so was going to be every chance,” she said.

“He won quite easily in the end, so he is probably our best chance.”

Shaun Campbell