Two weeks before the start of the season the players were pulled together from two clubs, East Sandringham and Hampton Rovers to form the East Sandy Rovers. The boys had to get to know each other, their personalities and football abilities. By the end of the season some great friendships have been formed which is a reflection of the boy’s adaptability. This is the great thing about team sport.
Our aim was to improve as a group and individually. The team we fielded in the lightning premiership compared to the team in Round 1 was unrecognizable. The improvement in the team as a whole and the improvement and confidence gained as individuals was a credit to the boys and the way they embraced the game. A lot of boys can kick mark and handball and have a grasp on the basic skills of the game. Plenty of improvement was achieved in these areas; however the real improvement came from the team learning how to play the game where everybody can make a contribution. Where to kick the ball into the forward line to give us the best chance to score a goal, how to defend when we are under pressure in the back line, where to stand at centre bounces and how do we defend when we are under pressure from the opposition.
There is still plenty of improvement to be achieved in these areas but understanding the team game concept is just starting to come to fruition at the Under 10 age group. The level of development of our team varied a lot and every player had the opportunity to play in all positions on the ground and develop the game skills required all over the ground.
Our training improved as the year progressed and we started to implement more complex game sense and decision-making drills into the sessions that related to the game day experience. We always has good numbers at training and the parent help roster implemented through the season gave the boys the opportunity to touch the ball more often during training.
The pleasing aspect of the year is that our less developed players improved markedly and with that I saw an increase in confidence both as footballers and as boys. I also witnessed great improvement from our better players and with that came leadership and willingness to get other players into the game.
This is the reason we had such great improvement over the year. Well done to everybody and thanks for the contribution of all those involved. The merged team was not easy to pull together but once done it is an obvious and sensible solution to give the kids the best possible football experience at this important development age. Thanks to Tim James for pulling it together and Rachel Cowell for implementing.
2014 was a great experience for everyone involved. Well done on the season.
