North Melbourne has officially restarted its Next Generation Academy (NGA) after the program was put on hold during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Arden Street Oval hosted the recent sessions, which were open to boys aged 12-16 and girls aged 12-17 from the club’s NGA regions (City of Wyndham, City of Melbourne and Tasmania) who are First Nations and/or from multicultural backgrounds.
AFLW players Niamh Martin, Erika O'Shea, Ruby Tripodi, and Eliza Shannon were on hand to help run drills for the girls NGA group.
The aim of the NGA is to engage and develop young players who live in these regions and provide pathways into the AFL via the NGA draft concession.
Through the NGA program, participants train under the guidance of newly appointed academy coach Nick Devereux and receive education on nutrition, strength and conditioning, recovery, and general football vision.
The program was also integrated into the club’s recent AFLW multicultural round matchday, with participants welcomed onto the oval pre-game for some skill work with the club's AFLW team.
"It was great to have our Victorian-based Next Generation Academy players come into the club last month," North Melbourne’s head of women's football and academies Nathan Hrovat said.
"We aim to provide our NGA participants with a meaningful learning experience, and to have such a large group of new participants along was a really pleasing way to restart.
"Our U13s NGA program supported by Werribee Football Club also commences mid-October, and we look forward to seeing the development of our youngest academy members under the guidance of Majak Daw and the rest of the team at Werribee."
A small group of North Melbourne’s father-sons and father-daughters also joined in, with Olivia Goldstein (Todd), Jorji Allison (Brett), Sahara Longmire (John), Connor Rawlings (Brady), Suede Makepeace (Troy), and Zachary Fairley-Marr (Ian) all participating.
"The way that both groups embraced our focus on inclusion and supported each other was incredible," Devereux said.
"It's exciting to see the talent on show, and we can’t wait to continue to work with participants in 2024 and support their football development wherever we can."
The club is always looking to recruit new talented athletes aged 11-18 from our regions into our academies, and encourage those interested to submit their details online via the following link - https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/nmfcngadetails
Further queries can be directed to the following:
- U13s Academy: Mngong@werribeefc.com.au
- U15s Academy: NextGenAcademy@nmfc.com.au
- 16+ Academy: NextGenAcademy@nmfc.com.au
