Former Gippsland Power premiership star Brett Dore will be back in action with VFL club Frankston this year. Picture: Stewart Chambers.FORMER star NAR NAR GOON and GIPPSLAND POWER junior Brett Dore is back training with VFL club FRANKSTON DOLPHINS.
Dore was recruited to the bayside club after missing selection in the 2005 AFL national draft, but suffered a broken leg early in the season that kept him out of action for the rest of the year.
The burly keyposition player, who starred in the Power’s 2005 premiership win over the DANDENONG STINGRAYS, is reported to be training the house down at the Kars Street oval.
STILL at the VFL and emerging NAR NAR GOON and GIPPSLAND POWER ruckman Nigel Benn is also hoping to make the higher grade with the CASEY SCORPIONS in 2007.
Benn will be joined by Power teammates and 2005 TAC cup premiership players Jaymie Youle and Ricky Delphine.
Youle, a powerfully built ruckrover is expected to make the transition to senior football with ease, having made his senior debut with PHILLIP ISLAND as a 15yearold back in 2004.
Delphine, whose home club is PAKENHAM, is a prolific ball winner and was a Victorian Country under18 representative in 2005 and 2006.
The loss of the diminutive rover will be a blow to the Lions running brigade.
The trio will make it six Gippsland Power 2005 premiership players on the Scorpion senior roster following the arrival of KILCUNDABASS pair Stephen O’Bryan and Ben Fraser and DROUIN halfback Chris Dunne.
WHILE nobody will admit anything publicly, there is rumoured to be a very strong chance that a fullscale AFL practice match between HAWTHORN and RICHMOND has been earmarked for PAKENHAM.
At present the Hawks are still involved in the NAB Cup, but should they exit that series, the Toomuc Reserve is believed to be their venue of choice after a recent training run impressed players and officials.
If it happens, it might be a nice little preseason earner for the Lions, with plenty of thirsty fans likely to attend.
GIVEN the recent hot weather and the fact that football training is banned at most reserves across the district, the sight of footballers pounding the sand has been a common sight at beaches between Frankston and Chelsea.
The BEACONSFIELD lads were spotted at Carrum recently, while HAMPTON PARK players are regular visitors to Bonbeach, but the TOORADIN lads apparently took their preseason torture a step further again if reports from Frankston are correct.
The word is that a group of Seagulls ran up and down the gutwrenching, steep Oliver’s Hill track, not once, but three times in succession recently.
Once up the bayside incline is enough for most to need an oxygen blast, but three times?
That’s just madness.
TOORADIN has announced that Terry Evans has agreed to return to the club to take the coaching reins of the Seagulls’ under16 DDJFL team.
The former Seagull returns from a successful junior coaching stint at KOOWEERUP, where he is the reigning under15 premiership coach.
Players are still needed for the side and anyone interested can phone 5998 3574 for further information.
PAKENHAM was the latest club to run the ‘1000 steps’ track at the top of Stud Road last Friday, but many of the Lions had the perfect way of cooling off afterwards.
The occasion was the engagement party of former president Scott Webster at the clubrooms and sources say that it worked out well with players returning to the club, having a quick shower, climbing the stairs and getting stuck straight in.
However, the following day, coach Jock Holland was being blamed for blowing the party’s budget thanks to the players’ increased thirst!
KOOWEERUP players could be in for some innovative advice if new assistant coach Simon Ponter has anything to do with it.
There was no better example of the former PAKENHAM spearhead’s lateral thinking than on New Year’s Day when he found himself stuck with the hordes on Phillip Island after attending the Pyramid Rock Music Festival.
Ponter had another engagement in Melbourne that night and simply could not waste five or six hours getting off the island in the thick traffic so he made his own arrangements.
The story goes that he phoned Demon teammate Daniel Crowley who zoomed over Western Port on his jet ski, collected our hero and sped back to Lang Lang, where Ponter had a taxi waiting to pick him up.
He had a shower and made it to town fresh as a daisy before his mates had snaked their way to San Remo.
Touche for ‘the Pontiff’.
INTERESTING to see the drought further separating the haves and havenots.
Word that pokierich EFL club NOBLE PARK has ‘bought’ training time on Mentone Grammar School’s private playing fields in Keysborough has apparently given one or two better off Casey Cardinia League clubs the same idea.
The rumour is that several schools in the district have been or will be sounded out as too what a few hours access to their facilities per week may cost.
WARRAGUL INDUSTRIALS is aiming to bolster its goalscoring potency in 2007.
That will be helped with nuggetty BULN BULN forward Matthew Gooden, versatile BUNYIP youngster Mark Hoult and mercurial NILMADARNUM forward Michael Santo all asking for clearances to the Dusties this season.
Experienced mentor Steve Pursell has been reappointed as the club’s captaincoach for 2007.
SOUTHERN Umpires Association (SUA) is ramping up its recruiting in the Casey area and will hold a ‘Be an Umpy’ promotion at Fountain Gate Shopping Centre this Saturday.
SUA president Jason Hughes said the umpiring body was keen to recruit umpires from the district and information on training and skills, together with training venues, dates and times would be available at the stand.
Hughes said the SUA was a progressive organisation and, given the growth in the area and the development of the Casey Cardinia League over the past few seasons, umpiring (field, boundary and goal) was a good way of being a part of the action.
The stand will be open from 9am until 5pm and all are welcome.
UMPIRES are set to enforce the controversial new AFL ‘hands on the back’ rule at local level this year. SUA boss Jason Hughes confirmed that the rule had been embraced by Football Victoria and would come in throughout VCFL and lower grade competitions. Given the lower skill levels of both of players and umpires at grass roots level, they and local spectators will need to demonstrate extreme patience with the interpretation of the rule or else much angst could be the result on and off field.
Hughes also indicated that, if practice matches were banned to conserve grounds as predicted recently, it would be a rude shock for clubs and players when football started in earnest and neither was ready or used to the new rule.
BERWICK trio Jason Dodd, Brad Miles and Matthew Ravenhall have all submitted clearance forms to join NYORA.
The 2006 premiers will be buoyed by that news because there are persistent rumours around the traps that the Saints will lose several of last season’s keys.
Sources at the club are tightlipped at present.
CORA LYNN is still active on the recruitment front despite a massive influx of new faces over the preseason.
The latest to sign with Cobras include BEACONSFIELD’s Shane Newman and NARRE WARREN wingman James Bradshaw.
Former Cobra Travis Boucher will return to the snake pit after a season at TOORADIN and the Cobras are waiting on clearances for several others including BERWICK big man Dan O’Hara, DEVON MEADOWS’ Craig Taylor (already rejected once by the Panthers), TOORA AND DISTRICTS’ Lincoln Toner, DOVETON lad James Arundale (rejected once) and ROC pair Tyler White and Luke McGee.
NEERIM NEERIM SOUTH has suffered a big loss with utility Chris Urie moving to Geelong.
Urie, a runnerup in the Cats 2006 bestandfairest and last season’s vicecaptain, has joined GROVEDALE in the Geelong Football League.
Rugged BUNYIP ruckrover Peter Davenport is likely to be a teammate of Urie’s having also applied for a clearance to Grovedale.
Paul Whelan will again coach the EDFL Cats with veteran Jack Halligan as his assistant.
RICHMOND was little short of pathetic in its round one NAB Cup hitout against GEELONG on Sunday, but the folk at ROC were still smiling after the game.
That was because former Kangaroo now Tiger stalwart Greg Tivendale slotted a ninepoint ‘super goal’ and earned ROC a $1000 bonus from the giant bank.
NAB has agreed to pay a grand to the home club of each player who boots a ninepointer and while the ROC boys enjoyed their earn, those at NAR NAR GOON will be keenly watching star NORTH MELBOURNE KANGAROO recruit Lachlan Hansen next week, in the hope that he can emulate Tivendale.
LAST season’s WGLFL premiers MAFFRA has lost three bigname players.
Midfielder Cam Streeter has moved to Western Australia and will play in the Western Australian Amateur Football League with WESLEY CURTIN.
Other losses are classy wingman Ben Coleman, a runnerup in the Pakenham Gazette 2006 League Champion Award, who will miss the season due to an overseas trip, and plucky rover Craig Robbins is likely to play with his brother David closer to town.
David Robbins may rejoin VFL team SANDRINGHAM after playing in the WAFL with SUBIACO last year.
