18 May 2019
President’s Comment:
Today we welcome the Eastern Eyre Football League to Ceduna and look forward to excellent football to be on display.
Both our leagues have something in common, the most pertinent being we are both four team competitions.
This in itself can cause issues particularly the fear of one of our clubs falling on hard times.
What would happen if all of a sudden we are confronted with having only three clubs left in the competition, this is one of the issues the Eyre Peninsula Football Council is dealing with at the moment.
It has been discussed over a long period of time at EP Zone meetings and both Eastern Eyre and Far West agree that the issues are staring us in the face – hard decisions need to be made!
Unfortunately other kindred leagues are not of the same opinion, it is evident they will continue to sit on their collective hands and do nothing.
It is well past the time for action, if a club cannot stand on its own two feet in the areas of player numbers, volunteers, financial viability etc then it is time for drastic action.
The subject of salary cap violations, wholesale recruitment of players from adjoining leagues and the player points system are all in need of closer scrutiny.
The situation that concerns me the most is inter-league recruiting. It is all very well to bolster your own club by recruiting and forestalling the inevitable but what about the effect on the other club/clubs?
The sooner steps are taken to limit the amount of recruiting the sooner the clubs that are struggling will face realty.
It is up to the powers that be to develop rules that will change the way of traditional thinking, club administrators will not be party to the demise of their own clubs and who could blame them.
Unless this happens, football on Eyre Peninsula will continue on the same path and we will be talking about the same problems in the 2020’s
And another thing, I watched and listened with interest and amazement as a spectator during last weeks’ clash between Thevenard and The Blues consistently mouthed off at one of the umpires.
It wasn’t reportable stuff but totally un-necessary and close to the mark of being personal, I suspect he was just showing off in front of his fellow supporters
Then it occurred to me that the perpetrator’s son was playing for one of the teams, no doubt this kind of thing happens on a regular basis every Saturday.
Don’t these people realise that many of our umpires are inexperienced and by doing the job provide the opportunity for young men to play the game.
So a word of advice to the “boofheads and loudmouths”, think before you start directing your venom at somebody who is giving your son the chance to enjoy playing football.
If you don’t, you may very well be responsible for making recruiting umpires even harder than it is at the moment!
Ron Redford - FWFL President
Last Modified on 17/05/2019 11:58