THIS week’s announcement that AFL Victoria and Cricket Victoria have struck a deal on ground usage is the sort of collaborative approach you need in these difficult times.
If community football at any level was going to go ahead in 2020 it needed to receive some concessions from cricket and thanks to common sense that has happened.
Cricket’s decision to delay the start to their season is a generous gesture, but in these difficult times, sporting codes, particularly community sports, need to work together, not against each other.
Traditionally football has finished its season in mid to late September in most country competitions across Victoria and cricketers start pulling on their whites in early October, but because of the coronavirus all sporting codes have been on hold, but it has been the winter competitions which have been most affected.
But with the Victorian Government relaxing social distancing laws and with more announcements expected in the coming weeks, there is growing optimism weekend sport could be back on the agenda sooner than later.
Knowing this, sporting codes at all levels have been hastily putting together plans for the relaunch of their competitions.
The SFNL is working towards a July start if by their June 16 board meeting crowd restrictions have been lifted and soccer and tennis are formulating how their seasons might look.
But with the SFNL still sticking to their original decision of “no crowds, no play” and the Millewa Football League and Millewa Netball Association announcing the cancellation of their seasons this week, it has opened the door for the other sporting codes in the region.
Tennis is one sport which could benefit from the cancellation of football and netball.
You only have to look at the number of football and netball players who play in the Mildura Lawn Tennis Club’s corporate competition during the summer to see how much interest there is in the sport.
The courts are full of footy and netball players enjoying a social hit. In fact, the winner of this year’s top division included two Imperials players, Brad and Colby Hards.
The Hards boys are very accomplished tennis players and would be a welcome addition to any Sunraysia District Tennis Association team.
I know Colby has already been sounded out by one club to play in its top division if the SFNL season doesn’t go ahead.
But while senior teams could receive a boost to their numbers through the cancellation of footy and netball, it is the local junior tennis competition which should be taking full advantage of the situation.
Junior tennis lost a lot of players to football and netball when the SFNL junior competition was changed from a Sunday to a Saturday morning.
This forced many juniors who played both sports to make a choice between football and tennis. And while the easy option would have been to change the day junior tennis was played, tennis officials decided against this, instead forcing kids to make a choice between the codes.
Junior sport is not about what suits adults, it’s about getting as many kids participating as possible and if that means changing the day because it allows more to play, then that is what should happen.
The cancellation of football and netball might mean the kids who were lost to tennis a couple of years ago could return this year, but it will be only a short-term solution if tennis continues to be played on Saturday mornings.
Once the SFNL starts back up again it’s inevitable these kids will return to footy and netball and again be lost to the game.
But that doesn’t have to happen if this year tennis administrators bite the bullet and play the competition on a Sunday morning, it’s an easy fix and the long-term benefits will be more kids playing tennis.
It seems to me to be a much better option having kids playing sport across both days of the weekend instead of being at home glued to their electronics.
