Andrew Kennedy confirmed he was a starter in the election a fortnight ago before bolstering his chances with the inclusion of younger brother Chris, Lisa Starr, Adam Thomson and Winston Rhodes onto a strong ticket of Mulwala area identities.

The Kennedy brothers operate a building company employing 60 people with Chris in his second stint as co-coach of the Pigeons after temporarily stopping the Albury Tigers juggernaut with back-to-back Ovens and Murray league flags in 2012-13.

The Pigeons could be playing Albury in a second semi-final on election day.

Mrs Starr is related to the Kennedy brothers and involved with netball at Rennie.

Mr Thomson operates a bus company in Yarrawonga-Muwlala and is also former president and player of the Mulwala Lions and Mr Rhodes is a former coach and long-time player at Rennie and Oaklands.

Andrew Kennedy said he wanted to give himself the best chance of securing one of the nine spots on Federation Council.

“I was always thinking of going down this path and above the line is the way to go,” he said.

“I’ve made a few phone calls to different electorates to see how they’ve gone about it.”

Corowa candidate Shaun Whitechurch has also gone down the ticket path after earlier announcing himself as an election contender.

He will be joined by former Corowa Shire councillor Norm Wales as his No.2, Corowa chamber of commerce vice-president Stuart Whisson, Paul Phibbs and James Webb.

Mr Whitechurch and Mr Webb were dual Corowa citizen-of-the-year recipients in 2010 and Mr Phibbs has had a long association CDHBU football club as player and president.

“The idea has been to get together community-minded people who are all in it for the betterment of the entire shire,” Mr Whitechurch said.

Nominations close at noon on Wednesday with a ballot draw at 4pm.