Presidents Letter Jan 2022

Dear players, members, sponsors, supporters,

Welcome to season 2022.

First of all I’d like to thank outgoing president Lex Marshall. Lexy is the heart and soul of the club. There’s no doubt the club wouldn’t be here without him or the people he brought to the club and no doubt he’s played a massive part in me becoming president aswell. I’ve admired him and his love for this club since I was a young kid and if I do half the job he did the club will be in a great place when I’ve finished my time as president.

For those who don’t know me my name is Daniel Booth or commonly known as Boothy. My family moved to Turner Rd when I was 5 and my dad (Rick) got involved in the club straight away. He passed away in 2001 and my mum (Carmel), my two sisters (Emma and Amy) and myself have been supported and helped by the people of the club ever since. The Highett Football Netball Club has always been apart of our family.

I am now 29 years old and have a family of my own. In 2022 I’ll be marrying my fiancé Emma Hamilton who I coincidentally met through the club as she was in the netball program. We have a 2 year old son Arlo who no doubt is destined to pull the Bulldogs jumper on in the future.

I’ve played roughly 250 combined junior and senior games for Highett. I’ve been a long time committee member, coached junior sides and as a kid I was in charge of the scoreboard but now I’m retired from playing I’m ready to step up and take the presidency role on from Lex.

As president I’m putting a key emphasis on bringing new players, supporters and sponsors to the club, bringing back past players, supporters and sponsors while also recognising and appreciating the members and sponsors we currently have.

I don’t want us to be viewed as just the Highett Football Club. We are the Highett Football Netball Club who will boast 2 senior men’s sides, an under 19’s side and 2 netball sides competing in the SFNL. We will have 10 junior male and female football sides competing in the SMJFL. We will be affiliated with Bayside Saints Super Rules Football Club who have 3 teams (supers, masters and legends). We also have a great relationship with Bayside Cricket Club and look to improve our relationship even further. We look forward to working alongside the SFNL, SMJFL and the Kingston Council as well.

We’ve got a great committee jumping on board for the upcoming season with 18 highly skilled and motivation club people on the committee which also includes males and females of different ages. Our motto is more people doing less work. In the past too much work has been left to too few which isn’t a sustainable system or fair on those doing all the work.

Jason McGrath will again act as Vice President as he is the junior president. Our juniors will be entering their 20th year as ‘Highett”. I remember the day we changed from Moorabbin to Highett and couldn’t be prouder to say we have a juniors apart of our club which some of our competitors don’t have. Our last senior premiership in 2018 had 10 past junior players in that side of 22 which shows the homegrown talent we have in our junior program. We will be working alongside the juniors more than ever. One subtle change we’re making is with the social pages and combining our junior and senior facebook and junior pages to solidify our ‘one club’ ambitions.

Martin Burke will again be secretary. I’ve known Martin for close to 20 years back when his son Liam was playing juniors for us. It’s taken me that whole 20 years to finally realise how much he loves this club and how much he does and will do for HFNC. I will be the face of the club as president but I can assure you that Martin will be acting as a ‘silent’ president and will be my sounding board and advising me on all decisions made. He is a very smart businessman and I believe we compliment each other well.

Our treasurer this year is Graham Dudley. Graham has been a part of our juniors for close to a decade and has coached and held treasurer roles. A full time banker at Commonwealth Bank, Graham brings a wealth of knowledge in the banking sector and pair that with his knowledge of the ins and outs of a football netball club he is the perfect person for the job.

This year we will be expanding and focusing on our netball more than ever. Last year Maddi Floros took the role of netball co-ordinator and brought new life to the netball side of our club so much that we’ve decided to change our logo to include our netballers in it. The club is a more friendly, vibrant and family orientated place with the netball girls and we’re rapt that we are excited to announce we are expanding to two sides next year and hope to keep adding a side each year. We’re also hoping to employ a netball coach for the girls this year.

With a few changes to our committee structure, we’ve created new roles instead of just being a committee member. One big title we’ve created is head of revenue. Elijah Shawcroft is stepping up to fill this role. Elijah retired this year after suffering his second ACL injury playing for us. Head of revenue will implement new ways and strategies to ensure we have the finances and funding to have the best coaching, facilities and equipment in the league. Elijah and his sub-committee have done a bulk of work already to raise funds and will announce new methods shortly like re-introducing social memberships. Our sponsorship packages have been tinkered with with a more ‘2 way street’ approach to potential and existing sponsors.

A few other key roles that have been filled are Facilities manager which Mark ‘Spud’ Prosser is in charge of. That pretty much covers anything to do with the actual club rooms. One sub role that fits under facilities that Spud will oversee is Bar managers. It’s worth noting that current players Chris Harms and Jack Prosser are stepping up and taking that role together which is great to see players getting amongst the off field jobs.

Mick Aldridge will be our Football/Netball Operations manager in 2022. Mick sees his and his family being apart of Highett FNC for a long time and wants to help make it the best possible club now and for in the future. Mick’s son Charlie or affectionately known as ‘Buckets’ currently plays in our under 16’s and is the reserves and seniors waterboy. With wife Jen and daughter Ruby they’re a great family who buy in 100% to make the club the best possible club. As part of Football Operations we have appointed a list manager in Damian Staford who has done a great job so far in contacting players and presenting Highett as a destination club.

Beau Jedd will lead our social committee which includes Amy Booth, Sophie Fanning, Maddi Floros, Kayla Davey, Emily Perchanidis and Tilly Branch. Amy and Sophie will also be in charge of our social pages, Miffa will be in charge of Social membership, Joel Jones (raffles), Damian Straford (List manager), Cam Mitchell (apparel) and Carmel Booth (distribution of apparel).

Brad Berry will again be our men’s Senior coach with Andrew Saultry and Craig Kernick his assistants. Dan Knopers will spearhead our reserves again. We also welcome Dimi Petrakis to our coaching ranks who will be in charge of our under 19’s. Current players Pat Singh and Jacob Duscher will be his assistance aswell as Dean Patridge who was the groups coach in under 17’s. Having an under 19’s is massive for the club and providing a pathway from juniors to seniors and we thank all involved in getting this side up. We aren’t full there yet so if you know anyone eligible to play under 19’s please get in contact with Dimi on 0425 471 452 or Damo Straford on 0413 093 295.

Going forward we will be uitilising our website (highettfnc.com.au) more. We will be posting more content on the website and it will also be posted on our facebook page. On our website there’ll be a club ‘online store’ option there. You’ll be able to purchase apparel, pay for social membership, player registrations and even sponsorship and player sponsorship all in the one place online.

Apparel is something we’ll be doing differently this year. We won’t be stocking items at the club like in the past. It will be an order and pay system online instead. To order you will have to go to our website, click on online store, click apparel then browse and pay online. We will have cut off dates for orders and then order them in bulk. Our supplier will then have the apparel ready for pick up from the club 4-6 weeks later. We will have the apparel uploaded to the site next week ready for orders so everyone can order their gear ready for round 1.

We’d also like to welcome Total Gas Care Plumping as our playing jumper sponsor and AMFX Metal Art as our apparel sponsor. If you’re interested in becoming a sponsor or even a player sponsor please check out the online store at https://www.highettfnc.com and then click sponsorship or contact Elijah Shawcroft on 0431 251 583.

We have a few roles still needing to be filled. We will be attempting the impossible task of filling all of the late Terry O’Keefes jobs. Tok was a club great who worked countless hours at the club. His main role was team manager of the reserve and seniors sides. If anyone is interested in the role could you please contact us. We will also need a canteen manager and a cleaner.

As you can see there’s been a lot of work go on the past few months. I genuinely believe it’s an exciting time to be involved with Highett FNC and I hope you all want to be part of it. Although we are back in division 2 I see this as a minor hurdle to our ultimate goal which is being a division 1 powerhouse. To achieve this we have to welcome some change to the club which won’t suit everyone but hopefully everyone involved in the club buys in no matter what.

Go dogs!