Holbrook's Corey McCarthy returns to home club after losing licence for speeding

The speedy defender made the surprise decision to join East Wagga over the off-season to play alongside his older siblings Daniel and Kieran in the Farrer league.

However, McCarthy rejoined the Brookers before the clearance deadline after being nabbed for speeding and losing his driver's licence.

"I live on a farm at Holbrook, so once I lost my licence it was always going to be hard to get to Wagga to train and play," McCarthy said.

"I'm committed to training hard and playing the best footy that I can, so the most practical solution was to rejoin Holbrook.

"I'm fairly happy to be back to be honest, happy with my form and the playing group seem happy that I'm back.

"I thought a few of the boys might have been dark that I left but everyone's been terrific."

McCarthy enjoyed a solid season under coach Matt Sharp last year with his versatility to play numerous roles including across half-back and half-forward.

The 21-year-old said he has played predominantly off half-back this season.

"I'm really enjoying my role and it's a lot easier to read the play as a defender than it is as a forward," he said.

Holbrook sit second on the ladder and remain Osborne's biggest threat who are on a 29-match winning streak under coach Joel Mackie.

McCarthy felt the Brookers had closed the gap on the Tigers.

The pair's last four encounters have resulted in 51, 66, 49 and most recently 21 point victories to Osborne.

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"I think we have got a much stronger list this season after recruiting Kolby Hennessy, Michael Rampal and Brad Carman being back full-time," McCarthy said.

"Kolby has added some height and pace to our attack.

"I will be surprised if Kolby and Brad don't finish one-two in our best and fairest.

"Probably the one thing we do lack compared to Osborne is a bit more speed on the outside.

"I thought we were a lot more settled against Osborne a couple of weeks ago than our previous meetings.

"We didn't panic and were a lot more composed and were able to generate a lot more inside 50m than the opposition.

"But we just couldn't hit the scoreboard as often as we would have liked.

"Internally we feel that Osborne is definitely beatable, that's for sure."

Holbrook's reserves player James Pieper is set to celebrate his 250-match milestone on the weekend.

Pieper also had a stint at coaching the reserves.

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