Director of Football Update - Term 2 2023
Greetings to all members for the 2023 season
This message contains:
- 2023 Season update
- Membership.
- Sponsors.
- Volunteer and Staffing acknowledgements.
- Coach Education.
- Upcoming events.
- Season reminders for parents, spectators, coaches, and players.
- Training resources for volunteers, coaches, parents, and players.
A belated welcome to the 2023 winter football season to all members at East Coast Bays AFC. This year we've grown to over 1500 members and 126 teams playing football under East Coast Bays, and despite some expected disruption with ground availability in the first couple of weeks, it's been great to see everyone out and enjoying football around the grounds.
It's outstanding to see such a growth in membership, with 13 teams and 357 new members joining the Bays. With plenty of football to come, it's an exciting time to be part of the club, with upgrades in key infrastructure currently being completed ahead of the USA Women's National Team arriving for the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup.
As well as new members, we also welcome back key sponsors to East Coast Bays in New World Long Bay, New World Albany, Team Mitchell from Harcourts Cooper and Co. and local café Beaufort + Co.
Across the club we've had a season full of positive stories so far, from some great home games in the NRFL, with a strong start to league for 2023, our girls Friday program being selected as an NZF Fantails Hub, to senior men's teams embarking on cup runs, the ECB Women's First Team notching up some great performances under new coach Adam Eagar, and tremendous progress from players in our Mini Bays, Skill Hub and Talent Development Programs for boys and girls. We’ve also had success in working with local schools Sherwood Primary, Long Bay Primary and Torbay Primary to grow community participation.
With so many great moments happening at East Coast Bays, we must thank all our volunteers, convenors, and parent coaches, plus an excellent staff helping us deliver direct coaching support to over 600 players each week from Mini Bays to NRFL. Alongside all our other volunteers and staff that make East Coast Bays the club it is, it's our pleasure to thank and acknowledge:
- Operations Managers Duane Sommerville and Gail Hanekom (Women's and Girls football)
- Football Development Manager Callum Simmonds
- Football Development Officers Mingi So, Faiz Syed and Grace O'Donoghue
- Development Coaches Daewook Kim, Thomson Nkoy and Adam Frisby
- AUT student placements Dan Stutt and Thomas McCann
- Women's First Team Coach Adam Eagar and 14s Girls TDP coach Grant Stott
- Convenors Julie Keoghan, Darko Nastevski, Peter Black, Michelle Goldfinch, Samantha Poland, Brandon Hanekom, Debbie Lowe, Jeff Honey, Lance Snelgar, Morag Ward and Duncan McMinn.
Behind the people mentioned above, a huge thank you to the board at East Coast Bays, who show absolute care for the wellbeing and future of the club, whilst being invested in volunteering around different teams and programs alongside their board duties.
There's a lot to look forward to in the second half of the year as youth and junior seasons conclude and the tournament season gets into full swing. Work to upgrade facilities as Bay City Park will also be completed. We will also be running Junior L1 & Junior L2 courses on Saturday 17th June and Youth L1 & Youth L2 on Saturday 24th June, details here:
- Saturday 17th June – 9am – 12pm – Junior Level 1 - https://mycomet-oceania.analyticom.de/my-comet/itemDetails/2693748809
- Saturday 17th June – 12:30pm – 3:30pm - Junior Level 2 - https://mycomet-oceania.analyticom.de/my-comet/itemDetails/2693846630
- Saturday 24th June – 9am – 12pm - Youth Level 1 - https://mycomet-oceania.analyticom.de/my-comet/itemDetails/2693845403
- Saturday 24th June – 12:30pm – 4pm – Youth Level 2 - https://mycomet-oceania.analyticom.de/my-comet/itemDetails/2693847235
For those who have matches on the above dates in the morning, we would advise to delegate the match day responsibilities to the team managers or reach out to our team for match day support.
Lastly, we have the pleasure of hosting both Quiz Night on Friday June 2nd from 6.30pm and Western Springs in the Chatham Cup on Kings Birthday Monday 5th June at 2pm. We would love to see familiar faces at Bay City Park for these events that are free of football for the rest of the club, Monday is a great day for the club to come together at Bay City Park ahead of the upcoming FIFA exclusion window.
A few reminders below to help everyone work together smoothly during the next few months:
- Please make sure pitches are vacated at allocated times so that the next group can set up and train.
- Please make sure all gear is put away securely before leaving for the night.
- Please submit your scores after games (even if you lose!)
- If you are training at the same time as a similar group and numbers are low, please take the opportunity to combine training groups and share the load between coaches. We have tried to allocate similar groups to train at the same time for this reason, gone are the days of training being cancelled due to low numbers.
- If your junior game is one-sided, use the NRF Game Day Challenge Point guide (at the bottom of this page) to try and rebalance the game so that everyone has a good experience. Too much challenge is demotivating, having things too easy is demotivating too. Either extreme isn't great for learning either.
- If the weather (or the forecast) looks wet, please assume your training or game is going ahead unless we announce field closures, or you hear from your convenor or coach.
- If you need to contact our team to resolve an issue, keep communication brief and structured so that we can assist you quickly and easily. If the issue relates to game day, please allow a 24-hour cooldown to organise your thoughts before contacting us, this will also help us in giving the best support we can to members.
- If you are a spectator, please stand a few meters back from the side-line, cheer on the players, but avoid giving instruction to players that may conflict with messages from the coach.
- If you are a coach, please support equal playing time for all players over the course of the season.
- If you are a player, play hard, play fair, and make sure everyone in your team has a blast at training and games.
Below are some useful links to resources that will help enhance your football experience as a parent, coach, or player at East Coast Bays AFC.
- NRF Junior Coaching Workshop
- NRF Junior refereeing workshop
- NRF Game Day Challenge Point guide NRF Game Day Challenge Point 2022 (002).pdf
- Performance Act (our Talent Development Program Mental Skills provider) parent workshop https://www.performanceact.com/parentinginsport
- ECB Parent-Player support guide ECB TDP 2022-23 Parent-player support guide .pdf
To find more information and resources like the links above, head to https://www.coachmate.sport/nz-football and download the CoachMate app for access to video resources from NZ Football, related to grade-specific coaching guidelines, injury prevention, game day support and training exercises for ages 5-18.
We hope you all have an enjoyable time from now and until the end of the season. Please keep an eye on your inbox as we release specific updates for different parts of the club.
Joe Hall
Director of Football
East Coast Bays AFC