BIG hopes are held by the little Australian Rules football players at the Auskick Gala Day at City Beach Oval this Sunday.
“I’d like to be an AFL player because my cousin Josh Kennedy plays for GWS,” seven-year-old Taj Dorrington said.
Taj lives in Churchlands and plays with the West Coast Junior Football Club in City Beach where the Gala Day will involve 12 junior clubs from Mosman Park, along the coast to North Beach and east to Subiaco, that comprise the Claremont Football Club district.
Get in front of tomorrow's news for FREE
Journalism for the curious Australian across politics, business, culture and opinion.
READ NOW“It is the highlight of the Auskick season for those children because for many it is the only time in the year that they get to wear their team footy jumpers and play against other clubs,” Claremont Tigers district development officer Sam Cousens said.
Cousens said Auskick had produced Collingwood and Fremantle player Paul Medhurst, who was in the Wembley Downs junior team as a child.
West Coast Eagles’ Eric Mackenzie was from the Claremont junior side and Fremantle Dockers Matt de Boer was a junior in the district’s Subiaco team.
The first two years of a child’s membership of Auskick is devoted to developing skills for the five and six year olds, and in their third year the youngsters get their first taste of playing against each other.
At the Gala, the young players will each compete in three Auskick games on 12 mini-ovals on the playing fields beside City Beach.
Claremont Tigers league and reserve players will host training clinics in the company of the West Coast Eagles mascot.