The former policeman and president of the Wangaratta Football-Netball Club won the countback from former councillors Doug McPhie and Lauren McCully .

He will fill the vacancy created by the resignation of Lisa McInerney.

After ruling out a possible call-up a month ago, Mr McClounan said he began to soften his stance on joining the council under threat of dismissal by the Local Government minister Jeanette Powell in the past two weeks.

He finished second to Anthony Griffiths in the first countback conducted last week, who passed up the opportunity of a return within the 48-hour deadline.

Mr McClounan made his decision to join the council within an hour of winning the countback.

“I am excited about the opportunity,” he said.

“My reasons for running for the council haven’t changed.

“You rarely get these opportunities and I am going to grab hold of it and see how I go.”

Mr McClounan polled the ninth highest number of first preference votes at last October’s election.

Soon after the election he replaced long-serving Paul Challman as president of the Ovens and Murray club which he also coached in 2000 and 2001.

Mr McLounan and his wife Mandy have four children aged between eight and 18 years.

He works for the state government in the department of planning and community development.

He admitted having a change of heart about joining a council with four internal investigations under way.

“My initial thoughts when Lisa quit were other things had come up and they clearly had,” Mr McClounan said.

“But talking to family and other people, the reasons why I ran in the first place were still there.

“I felt I had something to offer the Wangaratta community.”

He said he had no plans of resigning as the Magpies president at this point.

His elevation to the council comes when municipal inspector Peter Stephenson is due to deliver his first monthly report to the minister.

Mr McClounan is expected to be sworn in before the next monthly council meeting.