Dear Members,
This Sunday sees our 2nd annual Girls Showcase of Football Day with all of our 5 girls teams featured back to back on Whatmough Park. With almost 100 registered girls at our club, representing approx 20% of our playing group it is true that girls football is going places. We are indebted to the hard work and vision of Girls co-ordinator Bernie Girolami who has introduced and grown girls football at St Marys as well as everybody involved in the girls groups. The league announced some exciting plans to expand the competition and refine the age groups in 2017 and together with the introduction of Womens AFL football next year we look forward to our girls program continuing to grow bigger & better,
To celebrate or girls round, the club is supporting the McGrath Foundations work on breast cancer research by wearing pink socks this weekend. In a fantastic show of support by the St Marys community I am proud to report that over 400 players will run out in pink socks this weekend – thanks heaps to Kerrie Van Eeken for introducing and organising this initiative. In addition to the pink socks, Bronte Van Eeken and the youth girls team will be selling raffle tickets and rattling tins on Sunday with all funds raised going to the Mcgrath Foundation. If you would like a book of raffle tickets or a fund raising tin for your team please contact Kerrie on 0419 357 835.
As is customary, the celebration continues upstairs on Sunday night with 2 brilliant guest speakers joining us. Lance Picione, former AFL footballer and founder of the charity, Love Me Love You will speak about his charity which strives for positive change through awareness, education and acceptance to remove the stigma associated with mental health, drugs, alcohol, eating disorders and life hardships – empowering youths to reach their potential in life. We will also be joined by Monica Brennan, a local athlete who has been selected to represent Australia at this years Olympic Games in Rio. We are so fortunate to get such high calibre guest speakers at St Marys and I encourage everyone to come along, not just the girls , to show your support and hear what they have to say.
This Sunday Night: Girls Night
Special Guest – Lance Picione & Monica Brennan
Age Group: All girls teams though all welcome on this special night.
Food: Free pizza for the kids from 6:30 strictly on a first come, first served basis. Adult meals available as usual + the youth girls will be selling ice creams to raise funds for the McGrath Foundation.
Raffles: A suspension of the St Marys raffle as we support the girls efforts in selling raffle tickets for the McGrath Foundation. Don’t worry – lucky balls is back as per usual.
Next Sunday night – Colts Day
GALA BALL, GALA BALL, GALA BALL
Please see your team manager to book in for the highlight of our social calendar, the annual Gala Ball on Friday August 5th. Once again being held at Emerald Receptions in Thomastown this promises to be great night of food, drinks & dancing.
This is also the night where we farewell in an official sense our Top Age Youth Girls & Colts with a special presentation and the awarding of the highest honours at our club, the Bernie Girolami & Gerry O’Hara medals. We have reformatted the night to allow for a more convenient start time of 7 PM and promise less talking & more dancing. Tickets are just $95 a head and include beer, wine & soft drinks, a 3 course meal and entertainment from “St Marys own” Track 7 featuring life members Sam & Danni Gioffre as well as a special DJ set.
From Around the Club:
This year St Marys had a record participation in YJFL Representative Teams. Congratulations to all of the below players who competed in their respective teams:
U15 Girls 2 – Chloe Robinson, Erin Grant, Frances Collis, Indiana Murphy, Mikayla Plunkett, Samantha Temple, Talea Page, Trinity Voisey& Trinity Mills
U15 Girls 1 – Brigid McEntee, Ebony Clayton & Georgia Girolami
U14 Boys Div 1B – Charlie Stephens, Kane Francis, Matthew Marasco & Patrick Tobin
U14 Boys Div 1 – Tim Todd
U15 Boys Div 1B – Hayden Bolzon, Jackson Elzink , Sam Philp & Tom Hardy
U15 Boys Div 1 – Jaylon Smith, Jye Murphy & Kyle Johnson
I am please to report that both U14 boys teams and the U15 Girls 1 team were winners of the grand final in their division.
Due to the ground condition, Greensborough Park will remain closed to training & games for the next 2 weeks. Thanks to the patience and co-operation to all teams who have had to move or share training space as well as those who have been forced to play home games at away venues. Whilst we appreciate the inconvenience, we think essential that we provide conditions that allow the best standard of football as possible and unfortunately Greensborough Park is not up to scratch at the moment. We hope for dryer weather and a return to the ground for the last 2 rounds of the season.
Every player should have received a raffle ticket book by now or will do so this weekend. Our major raffle raises important funds for our club which go directly into our football programs by purchasing balls, jumpers, coaching equipment and the like. Tickets are just $2 and each book only $20 so it is an expectation that each family is able to sell one book. With the major prize of a $2000 store voucher of your choice for just a $2 outlay is should be a reasonably easy sell indeed. All books need to be returned by Sunday 31st July , with the prize to be drawn on Sunday night after our last home & away games on 7th August.
Enjoy your games this weekend and I hope to see you at the club for the girls celebrations.
Go Burra,
Evan Butterworth
President
