Eagles look to fill leadership void

Eagles look to fill leadership void

Incoming East Geelong senior coach Jeremy Power admits his side will have a void to fill as a result of the unavailability of his side’s co-captains this season.

Ash Brown, who also represented the GDFL interleague side under Power last year, told the playing group he would be unable to play this season due to his work (based interstate).

East Geelong

“He’s been brilliant for the club and he’s always helping out the juniors when he has had the time to spare,” Power admitted.

The gun forward would register 57 goals for the Eagles across his 27 games from 2016-17.IMG_0047

Last season he would also find two handy goals in the Raiders’ four point interleague victory over NCFL before receiving seven votes on Whitley medal night.

That same evening he was named in the GDFL team of the year alongside Dion Lawson (Werribee), Dylan Shelley (Corio) and Brayden Mitchell (Geelong West) from non-finals sides.

“We’ll miss his personality and leadership on the ground and people tend to forget he was a handy goal-kicker as well,” Power said.

“He’s been unavailable with his work in Canberra so this changes our forward line dynamic.”

He added, “Having said that we’ve been working on a forward six combination and how we play as a group so we are looking forward to seeing that come together and seeing the goal-kicking spread across our group.”

The announcement comes two months after his co-captain Earl Cody was struck down with a knee injury at the Richmond Crescent.

“Earl Cody’s injury was devastating before Christmas,” Power said.

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“Earl was showing all the trademarks of a club leader both on and off the field so we’ll miss his on field contribution.”

He added, “He was 5m in front of me and  it was one of those injuries from a tackle at training.”

“At the time we weren’t sure what the extent was but the poor guy has done everything so he’ll be unavailable this season.”

East Geelong will also be without reigning best and fairest Ruben Vesikuru (Birchip, NCFL) and Hayden Ververs (knee) nevertheless Power still looks confident ahead of their Round 1.

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The Eagles will host Werribee Centrals that day before facing arch rival Belmont (away) the following week.

“These departures just mean that we can try out some new players out and we’re still excited about where we’re heading in the future.”

By Alex Tigani
GDFL Media (16/03/2018)

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