Footscray Hockey Club

The junior final Come ‘n Try session is on two weeks from tomorrow, and we need donations for the Showbags (120) that we give out on the final night. If any members can assist with donations to go into the showbags – please contact Brendan Sheehan brendan.sheehan@sport.vic.gov.au

FHC have smashed their previous (recent era) record (4) of selected Victorian junior representatives by having an incredible 7 children earn their ‘Big V’ for 2009.
In age order the children are:

• Georgia Hopkins (U12)
• Kaitlin Grimaldi (U12)
• Reid Sargent (U13)
• Oscar Allan (U13)
• Olivia Colasurdo (U13)
• Sarah Breen (U15/U18)
• Alexandra Leeder (U16).

Add to this total Monday’s announcement that Sarah Breen and ScotShaw have been selected into next Summer’s Vic U18 Indoor hockey teams. Congratulations kids, and congratulations to the unsung heroes – the FHC junior coaches that taught these kids to play hockey! All of these junior families have received a generous grant from the Club towards the cost of their State tracksuit.

Season to date: The juniors continue to break our own junior section records at FHC: In 2009 – We have our highest ever number of junior teams – 20 (incl. ‘Minkey’), have had a staggering 75 new players to Rd 9, have our highest ever number of junior players – 236 (up from 201in ’08), have a majority of girls in the junior division – 119 girls / 117 boys, have had a record number of players selected for this years U13/ U14 /U15 Junior State Championships (‘Western Wildcats’) – 38, We have had a record number of FHC coaches placed in charge of Western Wildcats teams – 4.

State Championships
Currently the Junior State Championships are on at Royal Park (Monday June 29th – Sunday July 5th). Played on mid-week evenings and the following weekend, the championships will showcase the best juniors in Victoria, with Footscray being the best represented Club on display. Check out the fixture on the Hockey Victoria website, and come along and support the FHC kids!

Representatives Honours
We’ve had two new Vic Primary School (Vic U12) reps announced – Kaitlyn Grimaldi and Georgia Hopkins. Another product of Michelle Leeder’s magnificent junior goalie development program, Kaitlyn just got across the line from our own Ebony Pugh, whilst Georgia adds another chapter to the fantastic Hopkins / Thomas hockey story. Well done to all involved, particularly the FHC coaches, officials, umpires and administrators who have created the circumstances in which these kids have been able to develop their skills.

Reminders and Other Matters

1. There will be no junior training during the school holidays unless otherwise arranged between a coach and his / her families.
2. Check out the HVic website for notices re: Vic Junior Indoor Team Noms (close 29 July).
3. Have you heard about the Local Sporting Champions program that is now available nationally for individuals and teams? This Australian Government initiative has been designed to provide financial assistance for junior sportsmen and women towards the cost of travel, accommodation, uniforms or equipment when competing at an official national sporting organisation (NSO) endorsed state sporting organisation (SSO) or national school sporting competition. More Information: www.ausport.gov.au/champions. Applications for the 2008/09 grant cycle close 30 June 2009, so be sure to get your application in soon!
4. A special big congratulations top Mark White and Heather Shaw who are spear-heading FHC’s management this year of the Western Wildcats process. Keep up the great work guys.

FHC dominate Western Wildcats Selections
The Footscray Junior Section has broken its Western Wildcats player rep total for the fifth consecutive year. A massive 36 children have been selected, plus two further players have been named as ‘train-ons’ and are therefore emergencies for their Wildcats teams. The Wildcats teams will be training each Sunday from now until the State Championships in July and will then contest four games across that first week of the school holidays.

To underscore our current status, we also have a record number of FHC coaches with Wildcats appointments. Congratulations to Hernie Isorena, Les McAlinden, Mohammed (Fidz) Hafidz, Geoff Peacock and Lisa Anderson. Team Manager positions have been awarded to Piere Scott and Barry Allan. Thanks also go to the people that represented FHC as Wildcats selectors – Alex Grosz, Daryl Jahnke, Barry Allan, Anne Robinson and Lisa Anderson. Mark White and Heather Shaw are the mainstays behind the regional organisation of the Wildcats this year and are doing a fantastic job this far.

And the biggest thank-you goes to the people that give up hundreds of hours a year to make these kids the best that they can be – our outstanding group of junior team coaches at FHC. Take a bow all of you!

The children selected this year are:
Holly Azzopardi, Mahalia Bailey, Annalise Bettiol, Olivia Colasurdo, Melanie Corless, Georgia Hopkins, Chelsea Pugh, Ebony Pugh, Isabelle Skilbeck, Stephanie Thompson, Oscar Allan, Reid Sargent, Peter Wroblewski, Nicola Hancock, Ahried Isorena, Hayley McAlinden, Melissa Morton, Amy Scott, Joanna White, Tayla Williams, Tyson Breen, Riley Damnics, William Leeder, Angus Robinson, Vinny Sharma, Sarah Breen, Sheridan Corless, Ellen Druce, Caitlin Duggan, Gabrielle Lewis, Shannara Main, Ally Sheehan, Neil Duncan, Weston Howell, Patrick Meaney and Morgan Stephens. Trainons are Georgia Cutrale and Liam Braithwaite.

Several children were very unlucky to miss out, but our recent track record shows that our kids make it to representative honors eventually if they keep working at their game.

Coaching
Our coaches are certainly not resting on their laurels though. Last week former international star and Aussie assistant coach Jim Irvine was here running the first of two best-practice coaching strategy sessions with our coaches. Jim returns Wednesday week (May 27) to run his follow-up session on specific skill teaching.

Player Safety
Whilst we are determining our protocols for the use of the Junior Training Area, could all junior players be aware that they are responsible for the safety of younger children that they might be sharing the area with. We have already had one very unfortunate accident in there and that’s one too many.

Most of the Junior teams (non Shield teams) do not have badged umpires allotted to their games. Most of the home games are covered by Graeme Veitch, but we have a problem with the away games particularly U17 Girls North, U15 Girls North and U15 West Mixed. Junior teams cannot afford the situation where the coach has to take to the field to umpire. Is there anyone who may be able to help us out—teams may be able to cover the cost of petrol for any willing volunteers? Please contact Steve Pattie steve.pattie@dsto.defence.gov.au

The junior pre-season has been a roller-coaster in that our recruiting has been outstanding (60+ recruits registered already), but our trialing and preparation of the players has been disrupted by unusual weather, long weekends, eastern ground and junior training area unavailability, senior carnivals eating into our time, school holidays about to hit, etc.

Regardless of all of these factors we will hit the ground running in time for RD 1 in three weeks time. We have again appointed an outstanding batch of junior coaches, and the work of our age-group coordinators has been magnificent over the past month.

We are about to make our debut in mixed U13 ‘A’ and U17 girls ‘A’ grade, which will give us a presence in five of the seven ‘A’ grades in 2009. Over the next two years we will hopefully jump into mixed U15 ‘A’ and mixed U17’A’ as well. There is only one other junior Club – Waverley (out of 67 Clubs playing in Melbourne) that is represented in all seven ‘A’ grades. One season at a time though!

A key goal for 2009 is to develop closer connections with senior coaches and selection panels as our huge number of talented children are being asked to take on significant senior team roles / workloads, placing growing bodies under considerable pressure. We will improve those liaisons, and the children will continue to receive safe stewardship at all levels of their FHC involvement.

Key ‘Junior’ Dates:
This Wednesday (March 25): (1) Coaches pre-season meeting (6.30), plus Mouthguard fittings at
FHC (5.30 onwards)
Wednesday April 1: Junior Committee meeting
Rd 1 = Sat April 18 (last Saturday of school hols) & Friday April 24.
Wildcats trials: Sun May 3 and 10.

Families please ensure your registration forms are completed as this ensures you are registered with Hockey Victoria and covered by Sports Cover Hockey Insurance. Hard copies to be placed in the box next to the junior notice board. Or e-mail to nicolevirtuoso@hotmail.com (if you have not received the registration form via e-mail please contact Nicole)

We have a shortfall of umpires for some junior grades on Friday nights. This is because the grade is beyond the capability of our junior umpires (most are under 15 years old) or because siblings will have fixture clashes some weeks. We are seeking some generous senior ladies or men who might be out there who would commit to a team – U17 mixed and U15 girls each week; U13 A, U13 mixed some weeks. Some grades also will get a HV assigned umpire depending on the fixture. Support is available if they have not umpired much before, plus free umpire kit of shirt, whistle, rule book, cards and notebook and pencil.
Please contact Anne if you can assist. garobinson@optusnet.com.au 0417 313 658

Friday Night (20th March)

@Footscray

• 6pm U13 North (Red vs Blue)
• 7pm U15 Girls
• 8pm U17 Girls

@Essendon

• 6pm U13 A
• 7pm U15 PA
• 8pm U15 North
• 9pm U17 PA

Saturday (21th March)

@Footscray

• 08:30am U13 Girls
• 10:00am U11 (Red vs Blue)
• 11:00am U9 + Minkey

@Essendon

• 8:30am U11 A