Juniors keen to play ball

The South East Juniors football league is keen to work with the newly formed south-east league to help start their competition in 2015.

By JARROD POTTER

KICK-STARTING the senior-junior football relationship in the south-east, the South East Juniors are committed to building strong bonds with the former Casey Cardinia clubs.
The junior football league – comprising 26 junior football teams around the south-east region from Nar Nar Goon to Parkmore – welcomed the shift of the nine clubs away from the MPNFL (trading as PCN Sports Alliance) and hoped to work closely with the new league, which will apparently be called the “South East Football Netball League”.
South East Juniors general manager Shaun Connell believes the new league will benefit the area greatly as the connection between juniors and seniors are strengthened.
“It’s unfortunate that these things happen, but it also provides some great opportunity to move forward with some certainty,” Connell said. “SEJ has really been moving forward since the changeover back in 2009 (from DDJFL) and we’re really keen to work with senior footy to make it the number one sport in the region.
The South East Juniors and MPNFL had a frosty relationship in recent years, after the MPNFL’s decision to change its under-18 competition into under-17s and under-19s in 2014.
While that relationship did degrade recently, Connell was adamant it would not happen again with the newly formed competition.
“I think that as demonstrated probably through the issues with the under-17s and so forth it was an indication of how the relationship (between SEJ and MPNFL) had broken down a bit,” Connell said. “Moving forward there’s a great opportunity now for the leadership of the commission for junior and senior footy to work collaboratively with each other to ensure footy remains the number one participant sport in this region.
The South East Juniors have pledged to assist the new league with any administrative or governance resources as the SEFNL prepares for its first season in 2015.
“If there’s any way we can assist in the transition of where the senior league is at with its governance or its administration, we’re happy to work closely with the senior clubs to ensure the best outcome and however that might look like,” Connell said.
“This is a really big move and significant in the terms of the history of footy in this area and we’re just happy to work closely with the senior clubs and that’s now certainly more likely than it has been previously.”
The newly formed league will be based out of Casey Fields, just up the hallway from the South East Juniors and the AFL South East Commission offices.