By Nick Creely
The inaugural AFL Outer East season will provide boundless opportunities for the former SEFNL clubs, and ahead of the 2019 season, Pakenham are one club in particular with an air of excitement surrounding it.
From an early Christmas present, with the news of successful obtaining a $500,000 funding grant to go towards Phase 1 of the Toomuc Reserve building upgrade, which will encompass the upgrade for unisex change rooms, showers and toilets in particular for the netball and women’s footy, to the new building works which will commence at the conclusion of this football and netball season, the Lions are looking to forge forward as a united club.
Football president Travis Hamilton and netball president Marg Jones have been working tirelessly behind the scenes, along with the committee, to prepare for their new beginning in AFL Outer East, and describe Toomuc Reserve as having a real “buzz” about it.
From an on-field perspective, Lions senior football coach Ash Green is preaching patience as he looks to continue to develop a list he describes as the youngest he’s coached.
“We’ve lost a lot of experience and quality with the departures of Stephen Morey and Steve O’Bryan, so that hurts and it’s disappointing, but that’s just football,” he told the Gazette.
“But we’ve recruited well, we’re extremely young, and we’re super excited with the list – we probably have a bit more depth than last year, so we’re ready to go.
“It’s the youngest list I’ve ever coached – it’s exciting, but we’ve got a lot of work to do in consistency and putting good games together.
“We want to be competitive first and foremost, and respected with the way we play our footy – we want to stay in the contest more than last year, but we did play some quality opposition in the Narres, Berwicks and Cranbournes.
“We’re a bigger town than the other teams we’ll be playing, so there will be a bit of pressure on us I would have thought.
“We’re under no illusions that we’ll play some great teams, but we’re a work in progress.”
The Lions – who will play in Division One of the new competition – will have a new look list after specifically targeting former players,
“With the salary cap, we’ve got to be careful with our money – we’ve managed to get Josh Bradley from Doveton, he’s been fantastic. We’ve targeted guys like Kane Tyrrell from Berwick, we’ve got Dan Coinu, Jackson Bramich and Nathan Hopwood from Beacy, so they’ve been good on the training track too,” Green said.
“We’ve got Joel Sarlo back to the club too, a former junior best and fairest winner who played at Dingley as well, and Chase Blackwood as well.
“So we’re trying to get the players that have left the club to come back, so it’s a work in progress, and we feel like we’re on the right track on that too.”
Green said that pre-season numbers have been through the roof and his group have shown considerable improvement in certain areas of the game, but conceded that he won’t know where his side is placed in the pecking order; such is the unknown of the new competition.
“We’ve had really good numbers over pre-season – with the new league, we, like the other clubs, probably don’t know what to expect, so we’re a side with a challenge ahead of us, and we just can’t wait to start,” he said.
“We want to be a more attacking team, and when you’ve got a young team, you don’t try and work too much on the defensive side of the game, it’s more about playing with a natural flair.
“Having an extra year under their belts playing together helps, but we’re a young side, a work in progress, and losing players like Morey and O’Bryan does take us back a bit with quality.”
The Lions’ netball set-up is also gearing up for a big season, with the A Grade squad looking to build on an extremely promising 2018 season.
The A Grade side will once again be led by esteemed coach Karen Meredith, who has also been reappointed Wilson Storage Southern Saints Division 1 coach in the Victorian Netball League, and was also named a lead coach for the Netball Victoria Talent Academy in the Gippsland region.
Meredith told the Gazette that there were almost 80 people at the October trials, and that it’s added to the excitement of the squad.
“They were the biggest numbers since I’ve been there, it’s given us more depth in our senior teams with the addition of the some of the Under 17s coming up, so that also added to the trial numbers for the seniors,” she said.
“It’s added a lot of competition for the places available.”
Meredith also believes that the girls are unsure of what to expect as Round 1 nears, but they will instead steer the focuses towards controlling what they can control.
“We’ve got a few clubs from the old SEFNL that we’ll be playing, but there is a lot of rumour and innuendo about the clubs and players, but I’ve found that the best way to get around that is to focus on what we’re doing,” she said.
“I believe we’re on the right path – we’re developing players, they’re coming through and we’re getting stronger each year, so from my point of view, we just need to focus on what we’re doing, and what happens in the season happens.”
With spots in the senior sides set to be battled out over the next few weeks, Meredith is confident that the A Grade squad can build on their promising final season in the SEFNL, in which they tested the best sides in the competition on a routine basis, and expects there to be just minor changes to the side.
“There is a few that have been the last few years, and we’ve got some changes as well. We’ve had a couple of new players come to the club from other SEFNL clubs, so we’ve got a few ins and outs, but not a complete change,” she said.
“We haven’t announced our teams yet, and we’re still looking at combinations.”
The Lions will kick off their season on Saturday 13 April against Emerald, with senior football to open the season under lights at 6.30pm, while the A Grade girls will play at 6.15pm. They will then play an exciting Anzac Day clash against Officer in Round 2, with both Hamilton and Jones urging the community to get behind the club as they begin their new era.
