Greater Western Sydney team starts to take shape.
By Scotty Smalls for www.sillystories.com
In an exclusive interview with Greater Western Sydney’s AFL franchise coach, Kevin Sheedy, we can reveal that he has lost none of his left-field marketing nous. Capturing the hearts and souls of the burgeoning population of Australia’s biggest growth corridor will be an infinitely difficult task. Sheedy, famous for his scarf-waving antics and “outside the square” thinking on topics as diverse as Martians, marshmallows and Basketball crap, is the perfect man for the job.
Sheedy believes that fielding a competitive unit is important, no doubt about that. He’d like access to a Daniher or four, just to get the team leadership right, but he acknowledges that there are more important considerations.
According to Sheedy, Western Sydney-siders are going to need some convincing before they warm to Victorian-Netballer-Aerial-Ping-Ponger-Johnny-Come-Latelies. Many of the wonderful citizens of this great area have never seen a game of footy before so they will need other reasons to help them get on board, argues Sheedy. If we recruit hard from the Rugby League heartland that will help but that is only just the beginning.
Folau and Slater are already well-known sportsmen and admired here but we need so much more, he reasons, between mouthfuls of Parmigiana as we talk candidly over our counter lunch at the Bankstown RSL. The Greater Western Sydney area boasts large minority groups such as the Fijian, Western Samoan, Lebanese, Maltese, Kiwi and Les Girls communities, all of whom will be looking for representation. And that’s before we even think about trying to capture the imaginations of the Cronulla and Maroubra set, which could be the jewel in the crown for us.
The only solution is to look outside of traditional AFL recruiting grounds. Sheedy concedes that their Round 1, 2012 team could look something like this.
Backs: Billy Slater Mal Michael Israel Folau
Half-backs: Mark Latham Peter Garrett Paul Keating
Centres: Mikey Robbins Flacco Steve "Sandman" Abbott
Half-forwards: Robin Nahas Wendell Sailor David Rodan
Forwards: Pauly Fenech Hugo Weaving Ita Buttrose
Followers: Bob Downe Jake the Muss Andrew Lovett
Interchange: Jai, Sunny, Dakota and Koby Abberton
By Scotty Smalls for www.sillystories.com
In an exclusive interview with Greater Western Sydney’s AFL franchise coach, Kevin Sheedy, we can reveal that he has lost none of his left-field marketing nous. Capturing the hearts and souls of the burgeoning population of Australia’s biggest growth corridor will be an infinitely difficult task. Sheedy, famous for his scarf-waving antics and “outside the square” thinking on topics as diverse as Martians, marshmallows and Basketball crap, is the perfect man for the job.
Sheedy believes that fielding a competitive unit is important, no doubt about that. He’d like access to a Daniher or four, just to get the team leadership right, but he acknowledges that there are more important considerations.
According to Sheedy, Western Sydney-siders are going to need some convincing before they warm to Victorian-Netballer-Aerial-Ping-Ponger-Johnny-Come-Latelies. Many of the wonderful citizens of this great area have never seen a game of footy before so they will need other reasons to help them get on board, argues Sheedy. If we recruit hard from the Rugby League heartland that will help but that is only just the beginning.
Folau and Slater are already well-known sportsmen and admired here but we need so much more, he reasons, between mouthfuls of Parmigiana as we talk candidly over our counter lunch at the Bankstown RSL. The Greater Western Sydney area boasts large minority groups such as the Fijian, Western Samoan, Lebanese, Maltese, Kiwi and Les Girls communities, all of whom will be looking for representation. And that’s before we even think about trying to capture the imaginations of the Cronulla and Maroubra set, which could be the jewel in the crown for us.
The only solution is to look outside of traditional AFL recruiting grounds. Sheedy concedes that their Round 1, 2012 team could look something like this.
Backs: Billy Slater Mal Michael Israel Folau
Half-backs: Mark Latham Peter Garrett Paul Keating
Centres: Mikey Robbins Flacco Steve "Sandman" Abbott
Half-forwards: Robin Nahas Wendell Sailor David Rodan
Forwards: Pauly Fenech Hugo Weaving Ita Buttrose
Followers: Bob Downe Jake the Muss Andrew Lovett
Interchange: Jai, Sunny, Dakota and Koby Abberton
lease Explain? 
