Welcome to the 2016 football season! We’re glad to see so many familiar faces back out on the pitch, as well as quite a few newcomers to the Orange and Black. It’s gearing up to be a wonderful season here at Takaro AFC, and we’re excited to have you along for it.
While this was the first weekend for the Junior Club, the seniors were busy enjoying the 6th games of one of the most successful seasons Takaro has had in recent history.
The Chillmax 1st’s, playing in 360 Logistics Div 1, are currently placed second on their table, with four wins and two draws. This last weekend’s game was a hard-fought 1-0 victory over the PNBHS 2nd XI. The Chillmax 1sts are currently only 2 points behind table leaders, Feilding Reserves.
The Takaro Glory, playing in Div 3, are sitting third on their table, behind the Marist Greenies and Jokers. This weekend was an unfortunate loss to the Linton 2nds, but the team are still a point ahead of them on the table.
The Takaro Dribblers, playing in Div 4, are three points clear of their nearest competition, proudly atop their table with five wins and one draw. The Dribblers also have Takaro’s highest goal scorer on their roster, with Bradley Gillard currently having thirteen goals to his name across the season, including all four in this weekend’s game.
Our Takaro Maidens are back at it again this season, having played their fifth game over the weekend, playing hard on Sunday after spending the morning setting up for our 12th Grade Tournament. The ladies are a great social bunch and, while yet to earn a point on the table, are enjoying being back out on the pitch after a long summer.
The first weekend of Junior Football arrived like a whirlwind, with Monrad Park fit to burst with players, coaches and supporters.
This year’s First Kick’s team is one of the biggest Takaro has ever had, and seasoned Seniors coach/first time parent coach Adrian Doyle certainly had his hands full! Thankfully, he had lots of support from the parents, and the kids were wonderful, enjoying the drills and games enormously. This week’s First Kick’s Player of the Day was Aleasha Cole, well done!
The 7th Grade had a great morning too, as both players and coach Daniel Mackay got to grips with the Fun Football format. Dan is used to coaching in the older grades, but the players quickly showed him the ropes and put him through his paces. The 7th Grade’s Player of the Day was Mantis Northover-Timoti.
The 8th Grade Magpies had a bye week, but were still down at Monrad Park to run their pod drills and have some fun on the first morning of football. The kids were excited to be running around with coach Ray Bradley, and had great fun with different games, including a pretty intense game of tic-tac-toe with some unsuspecting adults roped in to make up numbers.
Many grades had mini grading tournaments, so it was a pretty full-on morning for these teams! The 9th Grade Jaguars were one of these, ably managed by ring-in coach Daniel Palfreyman as regular coach Kevin Palfreyman was away on business. The 11th Grade Lions are once again led by Lance Lynch. Both teams had to grind through several shortened games to make up the grading portion of the season in one morning, and while it can be a bit grueling for a first weekend run around, all the players made it look easy.
Sunday was the Takaro AFC 12th Grade tournament, which was as fun and successful as ever. Organising 16 teams to play all the games they need to, on the right fields, at the right time, is never an easy feat, but all was ably managed by the volunteers on hand. The referees on the day were provided by PNBHS, which was a great opportunity for young up-and-coming referees to get out and test their skills. Once again, a big thank you to all the volunteers on the day, setting up pitches, organizing players, staffing the food-tent, or any of the many other factors that go in to pulling off a tournament like this. On the day, the Hokowhitu Storm were victorious, but the Takaro Foxes had a great first weekend of the season and are looking forward to facing these teams over the coming weeks.
As some of you may have heard as I came around with the containers on the weekend, Takaro Junior Club is fortunate enough to be sponsored by T Market Fresh this season. Dave Spence, owner and operator of T Market Fresh, is sponsoring the oranges for each of our junior teams for the 2016 season, and we are delighted to have the business on board as the official Takaro AFC Half Time Sponsor. As parents will have seen over the weekend, the kids loved the tasty, fresh orange slices and will be looking forward to them all winter long.
As many of you know already, a generous grant from The Lion Foundation has allowed us to reduce all of our subs for this season. We always try to keep our fees as low as possible to ensure that getting involved in sport is not denied to members of our community due to financial situations, and this grant has allowed us to cut them down even further without having to worry about covering other expenses across the club. Once again, a big ‘Thank You’ to The Lion Foundation and to Kevin Palfreyman for his hard work on the grant application.
This week we have a few Special Mentions:
- All the senior players and parents who came out on Sunday to help out with the set up and running of the 12th Grade Tournament. Without you, the day could not have been the massive success that it was.
- Daniel Palfreyman, for stepping in to look after the 9th Grade Jaguars while Kevin was away on business.
- All the parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings and cousins of junior players who braved the early morning to come out and encourage our young athletes, they couldn’t do it without your support!
If you have any Special Mentions for next week’s newsletter, or any photos of our players, volunteers, or coaches in action, please send them to us at contact@takaroafc.org.nz
Until next week, yours in football,
Rachel