New club sets times for player try-outs

Matthew Galea

February 19 2014

Shepparton News

The Goulburn Valley Suns have announced trial dates for seven of their National Premier Leagues Victoria sides ahead of their inaugural seasons.

Trials will take place at McEwen Reserve and will start tomorrow and continue until March 1 , when each team will have an intra-squad practice match before final squads are announced.

Trials for the under-12s, 13s and 14s start tomorrow , with subsequent trials to follow on Monday, February 24 and Thursday, February 27 across the three age-groups.

Under-12s and 13s trials start at 6 pm on all three dates, while under-14s will start at 7 pm.

Under-15s, 16s, 18s and 20s trials are scheduled for February 21 , 25 and 28 , with the lower two age groups starting at 6 pm and the older two at 7 pm.

GV Suns board members Michael Criscera and Scott Hutchison will oversee the organisation and co-ordination of trials, with the club in the process of appointing a recognised English coach, who still cannot be officially named with the club still needing to ‘‘overcome some visa requirements,’’ according to interim chairman Geoff Dobson.

Criscera confirmed the coach being spoken to would also serve as the club’s technical director this year.

Coaches have not yet been appointed for any of the new club’s teams, but Criscera said there had been a lot of interest in the available positions.

‘‘Interest has been good, I won’t get into which coaches have applied, but we’ve received expressions for the under-20s and under-18s,’’ Criscera said.

‘‘Under that, I’m not sure which ones have had applications, but it’s been good to see some senior players from GNEFA (Goulburn North East Football Association) express an interest in coaching some of the junior sides.’’

Applications for the coaching positions close on Friday, with the board hoping to quickly appoint coaches so they can have a look at the players trialling.

The technical director-senior coach who is being spoken to will be present at the trials, despite not officially being appointed, and will have some input to squad selection with the newly-appointed coaches upon his own appointment.

Criscera said that the ideal number for each squad was 16 players, and said a lot of interest has been expressed and hoped that was reflected in the number of players attending trials.