HARDLY_SUPERIf you look at any club and see how many players drop out of footy between 14 and 18. Not many clubs turn a good number of their juniors into A grade footballers. It doesnt even seem to be club based. Could a contributing factor be at weaker clubs juniors get sick of losing and at clubs that are stronger with lots to choose from kids get sick of competing for a game each week?
I guess my point is im all for competition but are we going about Junior footy all wrong when it comes to the new Generation? Footy is a great sport for developement socially and personally but do we need to meet them half way?
WHEELS & DEALSJunior footy. This is where I get a bit pissed off by wankers saying that we don’t work hard enough on getting kids into our footy club. Give me a break; we work just as hard if not harder on trying to get kids to our club. 2 years ago we only had and under 8 and 10 team, last year we had 8’s, 10’s, 12’s and 14’s. The under 14’s even played finals in their first year. This year we will have under 16’s to add to that list. From what I have read in the last few pages people out there think we only spend money on our senior players and give nothing to our juniors. They could not be any more wrong. People say give them cheap subs or even free, funny we did that last year. This year I would say we have the cheapest subs in the SFL and we will keep trying to get kids to our club any way we can. If this means chucking in free shorts and socks and anything else we can think of then we will do it, if some of our sponsors want to pay for some of the kids subs well we will let them. There aren’t too many kids out there that play footy and aren’t involved in a club in some way, so if that’s where we have to get them from we will try our best. What we can offer kids is a game every week, not missing out every 2nd week or sitting on the bench for a half a game because that club has too many kids. All the clubs with dual teams good luck to you but if clubs like us, Marion, OSB,Aldinga and any other struggling club folds it may be a bit boring playing the same 4 teams all the time for a whole season.
CLUBS do a lot to develop kids personally and socially, however there are alot of kids that play footy who never get to learn the club culture because they bullied into playing school football. While this is great to have sport in schools it does nothing for football in general. Clubs are the backbone of sport in this country whether it be football/cricket/golf whatever. Without clubs we would not have the champions or the pathways to elite sport or community identity/belonging.
We are reading on this forum all the time and hearing around that Many community clubs are being deprived of their greatest assets: teenage players because of private schools who play interschool for bragging rights, but in essence do not give back to the community in general. Kids play with little or no support outside of maybe the 1st eighteen.
At the junior level we have clubs investing large amounts of money and time in junior development coaches, programs, structures. Then our kids get handed over to private school sport. They've been coached, trained and developed by us, and we get nothing in return. We in a lot of cases never see these kids again as they get lost to the sport. Club sport is very important for the community. It is about time that the powers to be at Elite level AFL/SANFL realised this and supported club programs and encouraged the schools to go and mke the move to mid week sport where they have a captive audience.
Private schools would probably not like to hear that the practice of them demanding that kids play school sport as well as study at a school creates a segregated community, it does nothing to improve a childs social skills. We will end up with sections of the community not community minded, and elitist attitude, when really there is nothing to be elitist about.
Glenelg and the SANFL have approacehed Cove to be involved in assisting with the re building of school football in our area, but at what cost to Cove and the community club is has established? All clubs and the league need to be proactive in lobbying the SANFL/AFL in getting a better deal for junior sport at club level.
2 canteen volunteers told to stay home 
