2022 Premier Grand Final – From The Chairman

Tomorrow is Eastland Premier Division Grand Final Day at Bayswater.  We look forward to the clash between the Rowville Football Club and the Noble Park Football Club. For Rowville, it is their first top tier Senior Grand Final and for Noble Park it’s a return to the last day of the year after almost a decade long wait.

Congratulations to all teams who have won premierships this year across our football and netball competitions. Our finals matches have been well attended and the support for our women’s teams playing in Grand Finals in both football and netball has been a real highlight.

Silvan won the Division Four Senior grand final and Waverley Blues won both the Seniors and Reserves, with the latter being a golden point win after playing extra time.  In Division Two the South Belgrave Football Club won the flag against Ringwood and in Division One East Ringwood proved too strong for Mooroolbark.

In our women’s competitions the following clubs won premierships.

This year marks the fourth year of the 5-year 2019-2023 Strategic Planning Period for the league, with the key pillars being: Clubs, Participation, Community and Partnerships, Operational Excellence and Financial Management.  The period has seen some real highlights and many significant reforms that have helped the league and our clubs continue to prosper. Some of these include:

• Re-emergence of the ‘Community Club’, strong alignment between Seniors and Juniors.
• Post COVID-19 return has been solid despite the challenges presented, total participants in 2022 totalled just under 16,000 (14,800 football).
• The league successfully applied for female funding from AFL Victoria for new teams and competitions in 2022 which has enabled the league to reduce fixed charges to clubs.
• The league and many clubs have successfully applied for SCIF funding unlocking opportunities for clubs to access funds for jumpers and smaller capital purchases.
• Over 35’s competitions played the first twilight Grand Finals in the League’s history.
• Attendances at finals matches have been significantly up on prior years and our six Senior Women’s Grand Finals were very well supported.
• Investments in club facilities by Councils, AFL Victoria and State and Federal Government continue to support participation development across age and gender.
• Match day vision provided by LKLM Media, Sportscast Australia along with Premier Data.
• The divisional restructure continues to deliver more competitive games across the League.
• Continued growth in the Leagues media operations and digital footprint.
• Improved club and league financial stability that has resulted in fixed charges to clubs remaining flat and the League being able to support clubs through COVID-19 in 2020 (no charges) and the cancelled season in 2021.

The last three years has seen many challenges and changes to our environment, we expect this evolutionary window to continue to shorten.  We must continue to adapt and evolve the game, attract more multicultural players to the game and to accommodate changing lifestyles, differing levels of competitiveness and reasons for playing football.

I’d like to recognise the valued support of our EFNL sponsors, our naming rights and major sponsor Eastland, major community partner Bendigo Bank, and major sponsors Deakin University, Yarra Valley Water, BJS Insurance Brokers, Carsales and 1116SEN. To all our other sponsors, suppliers, and partners, thank you for your ongoing support of the league.

The support of all our sponsors, partners and suppliers enables the league to continue to operate and provide a high level of service to our clubs that has seen the EFNL be well respected amongst its peers.

This year the League continues its partnership with the Blue-Ribbon Foundation.  For over ten years the Foundation has provided best on ground medals for all Senior competitions and the players will wear blue and white armbands out of respect and to raise awareness for those police officers who have lost their life while on duty.  Today’s donation of $15,000 from gate receipts to the foundation will take the tally over the $250,000 mark.

Across our junior and senior finals, 28 clubs have hosted finals and from the feedback we have received they all did a marvellous job of hosting.  Thank you to Maroondah, Monash, Whitehorse, and Knox Council for making venues available for Senior finals.  We thank Knox Council and Bayswater FC for hosting today’s game, one the biggest events held annually in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne, and one which requires a significant amount of planning and effort to present. As has been noted by many the surface at Bayswater Oval has seen a big improvement over previous years which is a credit to the groundskeeper.

We have seen significant investment across the East in facility improvements and we look forward to this momentum continuing over the coming years.  It’s clear that facilities capable of accommodating all participants is vital if we are to increase participation across age and gender and increase the utilisation of the facilities.

I would like to thank my fellow Board Members, the Junior Advisory led by Leon Bailey, and the EFNL staff for their efforts this season. As the league gets bigger, so does the workload with matches now being played from Friday night all the way through to Sunday night games.

Finally, to the volunteers who are the heart and soul of EFNL footy I say thank you for your immense contribution. We are all proud to be part of the EFNL family and it’s the cumulative efforts of the individuals within our clubs that help maintain the leagues high standing in the wider community.  Post COVID-19 there is great relief and enjoyment in the delivery of a full finals series.

Community Football and Netball has bounced back strongly and is alive and well in the East.  The League will continue to take up the challenge to responsibly maintain and grow to provide the best competitions for all participants.

Thank you all for your support in 2022 and we look forward to three great games today. May the best teams win.