The Storm had three teams finish either fifth or sixth - their A Grade netball, Senior football and 15 and Under netball sides.

Jeparit-Rainbow president Jason Hutson was disappointed with the news but said it was "not surprising with the way the year's been".

Hutson felt for the Storm's A Grade side in particular who are in a significant finals' drought.

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"I know it's disappointing for the A Grade netball girls, it would have been their first finals' appearance for quite some time," Hutson said.

"It's probably been nine or ten years since they've played finals so they were really looking forward to it.

"They've been building up to it. 2019 we had a pretty good finish to the year and we just missed out on playing in the finals and then we added a couple more to their squad and had a pretty handy side."

Although disheartening for Jeparit-Rainbow, Hutson was grateful that his club was able to play as many games as they did.

"We were probably pretty lucky to get 12 rounds in," he said.

"Better than last year we got nothing last year. We trained up until two weeks before we started and that was it.

"It was good for the juniors to get back into the game as well."

The Storm as a club recruited well after the 2019 season, adding the likes of Wimmera netball legend Penny Fisher to their A Grade netball side and Jay Kirkwood to their Senior football team. Both players contributed heavily to the Storm's on field fortunes in 2021 and if the Storm can keep the crux of both those sides together, they will no doubt be competing for finals again in 2022.

Pimpinio, Natimuk United and the Swifts also had three teams each miss out on finals that finished fifth or six.

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