Mixed emotions for Isaac Muller as Albury reaches Ovens and Murray grand final

The Tigers ruckman, who had 42 hitouts and 11 contested possessions in Sunday's win over Wangaratta, had daughter Evie in his arms as he walked into the packed rooms at Birallee Park to sing the song with his team-mates.

Stood alongside his wife Chloe as the post-match debrief spilled onto the oval, Muller stopped to take it all in.

"It's a surreal moment, it's pretty special," he said.

"I get a bit emotional because it's been a hard time for my family so to be able to achieve this is pretty good.

"We'll go into next week with full confidence and if we win that, it'll certainly be worth all the hard times we've had.

Muller was named in Albury's best for the 13^th times in his 18 games for the club after the Tigers accelerated clear of last season's grand final winners to win by 41 points at the home of Wodonga Raiders.

"The way we fought out the last quarter, to win the game the way we did, was probably the most impressive thing," Muller said.

"It's a credit to the boys that we knew, if we were in striking distance in the last quarter, we'd be able to run the game out on a big deck.

"The momentum we created was pretty much unstoppable.

"When I came off, with about 10 minutes to go, it was nice to be able to soak up that moment with our support staff and our fans in the crowd."

But now Albury faces a Pigeons side which snuffed them out in the second semi-final and is looking to go one better after losing the 2022 decider by just three points.

"They're very well-balanced, right across every line," Muller said.

"They really make the ground small so if we can open them up a bit, that'll be really nice and not allow them to drop off and clog up our forward line.

"That was pretty obvious, I think, when we played them at the Bulldogs - we played into their hands pretty well that day."

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