By Matt Fotia
Templestowe coach Craig De Corsey is happy to wait for success in Division Two if it means his Dockers will be ready to compete in Division One straight away.
The Dockers remain in the third tier of the Eastern Football Netball League, a division they’ve been in since 2011, after missing the finals in 2019 despite sitting on top of – an albeit incredibly tight – ladder after 13 rounds.
Alas the men in Purple won just two of their last five matches to finish in fifth on percentage and De Corsey is still rueing their awful luck with injury which saw a number of players end their season prematurely.
“Our goal was to make the finals if we could after adding a couple of extra players to the list that we thought might be able to get us up playing finals footy, but it wasn’t to be.”
“We had an unlucky run last year with injury, we started the season really well but we were hit with injuries throughout the season and it was a real battle to keep guys on the park,”
“I think we ended up with three or four season ending or serious injuries which really tested our depth,”
“With Division Two being so even, so little between each team, those injuries made it really hard and we just missed out in the end with a few tough losses at the backend of the season.”
The Dockers were set to tackle 2020 with a similar list with former player and league medal winner Kane Maghamez the only significant inclusion at Porter Street.
“We were looking forward to the season, we didn’t recruit that heavily and maintained the majority of our list,”
“We had a good pre-Christmas camp and we were looking pretty positive this year with everyone back fully fit, with some of the younger guys really showing some improvement after another pre-season.”
Most of their off-season work was spent solidifying its Under 19 program with the Dockers, like all inner east EFNL clubs, struggling to compete with private school football element when it comes to young talent.
De Corsey is confident that the foundation being put in place now will help the club blossom for years to come however.
“We’ve got the battle like most inner east clubs with juniors coming through, a lot of them being private school kids,”
“We’re trying to work with the junior club to get something going with feeding our senior club, but we had a good group of under 19s ready to go this season after some hard work behind the scenes putting that together.”
“The club is realistic with where we are at, it would be a huge success for us to get out of this division and be competitive in division one,”
“That’s what we’re trying to set up for, not to just try and put all the eggs in one basket win a flag and then drop straight back down,”
“We’re trying to put it into place so the club can have long term success and if it takes us three or four years to win a premiership in the division we’re in, so be it.”
Currently there isn’t much more the Senior Coach can do but maintain a positive vibe amongst his playing group and hope that they’ll be kicking the leather around sooner rather than later.
“We’re going the best we can and my job is to just keep the guys as positive as we can and hopefully we’ll get some football.”
Meanwhile Templestowe’s women will be looking to improve on their impressive 2019 Deakin University North Division campaign, which saw the Dockers finish fourth after the home and away season concluded three games back from third placed Chirnside Park, who they would go on to face in the elimination final, where they fell two points short of an unlikely victory.