By Davis Harrigan
With 2021’s runaway minor premier Coldstream being promoted; the gate is finally wide open for the luckless Forest Hill to strike in 2022 but coach Justin Scicluna is under no illusions how formidable the challenge will be this season.
Finals are clearly on the agenda for the Zebras, but Scicluna is keen to keep his chargers’ feet firmly grounded in the present.
“Like every other club in the division, our goal is to play finals football, and we’re long way away from that right now,
“So, for us we’ve made a big focus on Round One, which is our first big challenge,” Scicluna said.
“From there, we’re going to be taking to be taking it one week at a time, looking at it as a bit of a mountain to climb to get to that September date.”
Whilst the Zebras have been active on the recruiting front, Scicluna’s priority was to keep the majority of the 2021 group together.
“The first thing we did was we put the time and effort into securing our list from last year, we got 95 percent of those guys re-committed which was fantastic,
“It highlights that the club is going in the right direction,” Scicluna said.
“From there, there’s a couple of guys we targeted and were successful in landing, and it started a bit of a chain reaction, we landed one of a pair of brothers who had some friends playing in the Outer East,
“We also landed a couple of experienced players, and it was a bit like a domino effect,
“It’s just been fantastic, these guys have embraced the club for what it is now, and they just fit in so well,
“They’ve already gained the respect of the playing group.”
Those recruits that have assimilated so well into the Forest Hill culture come from a variety of locations.
There’s a big group coming down the highway from Outer East Football Netball League club Yea, a classy defender from Scoresby and an ex-pat returning from the UK.
“Definitely the new recruits that have come across are going to add a lot of experience to the group,” said Scicluna.
“Guys like Daniel Evans, Ash Walsh, Cam Evans Patrick Evans, and then there’s a couple of surprise packets that have joined us, a big fella by the name of Alex Watson has moved back from England, and we’ve just secured the services of Adam Bronsgeest from Scoresby.”
Progress is on the rise, bolstered by strong numbers and an eagerness to come back to football stronger and that’s accompanied by a desire to strive for the best possible outcome this season.
“I think the foundation’s come from having a solid pre-season, we can tick that box right now and say we’ve prepared ourselves well,
“Our numbers on the track have been close to 40 or 50 every night and from there, it’s just a matter of maintaining our training standards and living our values in every session and game.”
Scicluna is open to being flexible in his approach to every game this season, happy to do some work on the opposition, rather than remain steadfast and true to one way of playing.
“We’ve got our brand of footy which we’re trying to play, but on a week-to-week basis, based on the opposition, something always needs to change,
“But we believe that our style’s going to be good enough to help us beat sides on a weekly basis.”
The greatest improvement for Forest Hill is going to come from within, despite their list of recruits, and there’s already great signs demonstrating that change is happening.
“It’s probably our on-field voice, and I think for a fact that with the recruits we’ve got in already we know it’s been corrected,
“We’ve seen that at training, it’s just gone to another level,” Scicluna said.
“As well as our two-way running on-field, especially coming from our midfield group just to support our backs, so we’re excited to see how it all gets put into place.”
