Key to club’s success

By Justin Robertson
EMERALD Football Netball Club president Bill Kuys saved his club from extinction.
He won’t outwardly admit it, but his volunteer of the year award at the Victorian Country Football League premier’s dinner is solid proof: his tireless work of making sure his club did not sink has paid off.
In 2006, Emerald barely had 19 players on their list at the start of the home and away season. Now, through Kuys and his well-oiled administration, it boasts 150 plus players and members and is the only team in the Yarra Valley to field teams in all grades of football.
All in the space of four years. And all under the Kuys watch.
“I’m pretty chuffed at winning the award,” Kuys said. “The work you do is not for the award, you want to do something for the community and the people in the town. It was totally unexpected and very humbling.”
Ray Patterson from the Strathfieldsaye Football Netball Club was the joint winner of the volunteer award with Kuys. The function, at Hilton on the Park on Saturday night, was attended by 500 people.
VCFL representative Jock Allen said once the nominations were whittled down to four, they were sent to a panel of judges who looked at key criteria including the impact the volunteer had on his club, its culture and physical representation.
“He (Kuys) ticks all these boxes,” Mr Allen said.
“He’s had a long association with the seniors and juniors, executive level and his work on the club’s administration was something we thought was exceptional.”
Kuys was influential during his role as president when he took over in 2003, but he said the club took a negative turn in 2005 when it started a weekly ritual of losing games by 35 goals – sometimes more. Players then eyed other clubs and better competitions to play their footy and it seemed like the club would fold.
“We had to do something. We called a crisis meeting and called the whole town – police, traders, schools, even the VCFL and Yarra Valley,” he said.
“We set up a purpose statement and business plan and we’ve rigidly stuck to that, which also changed the culture of the club.”
Emerald Football Club went from being a place to “put a few down” to amore family oriented club, which Kuys admits changed everything.
“We were really struggling to get under-16s and juniors coming through to senior level because parents were extremely reluctant to lets their kids play at the senior club,” he said. “Now we are the preferred club in the area.”
Once the business plan was mapped out in 2007, the club won a bronze and silver award in the AFL quality club program – an initiative that focuses on elite standards of club administration.
At the awards on Saturday night, it won the gold standard, the first VCFL club to ever achieve it.
“As soon as we brought in the playground for the kids, each game day is chock-a-block with families and the clubrooms are full of prams,” he said.
“We are getting a lot more people to the club and a lot more support.”
Premiership certificates were presented to all VCFL flag winning sides in football and netball – including Casey Cardinia clubs Narre Warren and Beaconsfield, Ellinbank clubs Nar Nar Goon and Poowong and Gippsland Football League clubs Maffra and Drouin.