Swans Pilbara Development Camp

Swan Districts Football Club provided a community and talent football camp last week in Dampier for boys across the Pilbara. This included training for 10 to 14 year olds and matches for under 16’s players.

The club’s Talent Manager Greg Harding and Swans WAFL star Frank Anderson delivered the camp with the help of the West Pilbara Junior Football Council (WPJFC) led by Trevor Fawcett (Karratha), Brendon Archer (Dampier), Adrian Fahey (Port Hedland) and Andrew Sheldon (Wickham). Ngurra Kujungka also helped five Martu boys and three girls from the Western Desert attend the camp.

“They all did an incredible job to facilitate such an important event”, said Greg Harding.  

All players trained up to six weeks in their local town hubs in preparation for a carnival in Exmouth against Gascoyne and Geraldton teams. However, due to unforeseen circumstances the organisers had to cancel the event at late notice. So the WPJFC immediately came up with Plan B, which allowed for even more players across the Pilbara to participate.

The junior training session included 20 young 10 to 14 year olds on Saturday morning. “The session was aimed at increasing volume in their training and the kids did a great job. We followed training by filming the players performing their skills so we could provide individual feedback on fundamental skill and areas of improvement”, said Greg Harding.

Players were able to utilise a large number of new footballs provided by club sponsor Sullivan Logistics. After the camp, thanks to Sullivan Logistics, Swan Districts left $3,000 worth of new footballs to be used by local junior clubs across the region. The aim of Swan Districts is to one day have a football in the hands of every player at every training session.

The training session was also a great opportunity for participants to see vision of the correct way to perform skills and be given a few things to work on over the coming year.

Later in the day, 40 of the region’s best male junior footballers competed in a game at Windy Ridge Oval in Dampier. Greg Harding was pleased with the Pilbara talent of show. “Everyone was very impressed by the quality of play, especially in hot and swirly conditions”.

After the game Greg Harding provided players, coaches and parents information relating to the club’s new talent pathway and spoke to the players about expectations around physical preparation. Frank Anderson was able to clearly outline a week in the life of a semi-professional footballer and highlight the demands of the modern game. “We followed this with dinner and used the incredible venue that is Windy ridge to have 100’s of shots on goal under lights until late into the evening”, said Anderson.

On the Sunday, Greg Harding and Frank Anderson helped local coaches provide a fundamental skill session which also included collecting vision on each player for analysis and revision. This was followed by the second match which was of an even higher standard than the first. The players showed a great ability to share the football and play with speed. The game had a number of high quality passages of play that would be the equal of any football in the state.

Swan Districts and the WPJFC would like to acknowledge the incredible support it received from a number of local businesses.

“Firstly, Lasts Transport were brilliant with their support of the weekend. They provided a bus and fuel, and whilst we were not able to use that offer due to the change of venue, they then supported the girls camp free of charge”, said Greg Harding.

“The food provided by Cherrata Lodge was first class! All meals were provided and delivered to the venue including all utensils etc which made our life a whole lot easier”.

“This local support of football is vital to building a successful pathway for boys and girls across the Pilbara. Events like these can be logistically challenging, but with community minded local businesses at our back, we know we can provide a high quality and professional product that helps Pilbara kids chase there football dreams”.

The Swan Districts regional Pilbara program has a busy 3 months ahead with a number of exciting new opportunities on the horizon. These include flying selected players to Perth in March to be a part of the Under 16’s program, providing a Pilbara vs Kimberly Under 16’s boys game in the July school holidays, and providing a team to play in the under 19’s Landmark Carnival in Perth in July – the first time we will have a representative team from the area in well over a decade.

Opportunities for under 14’s and 15’s development players will be communicated to local clubs, players and parents in the near future.

For more information on any Swan Districts junior football programs contact Greg Harding on 0447 776 865.