NEW ZEALAND international Luka Prelevic trained with Aspendale Stingrays last Thursday and the State 5 South outfit is making an audacious bid to sign him. If it succeeds it will have completed the signing coup of the season as Prelevic is only 23 years old and it is unprecedented for a top-flight player of that age to drop down six league levels. Prelevic has been on the books of Port Melbourne and Melbourne City and last season made 19 appearances for Pascoe Vale, which finished fourth on the NPL ladder. He was in New Zealand’s under-23 squad that competed in…
Author: Craig MacKenzie
SOCCER PETER Blasby is the new goalkeeping coach at Langwarrin. Former Langy star and club vice-president Chris Jones was forced to step down from the post due to work commitments. Blasby has already had a stint as Langy goalkeeping coach as well as assistant coach of the reserves. He boasts a celebrated playing career at Frankston Pines, Albion Rovers, Heidelberg United, Melbourne Croatia (Knights), Morwell Falcons and Croydon and he was selected in Melbourne Knights’ Team of the Century. Blasby is widely acknowledged as one of the best specialist coaches in Victoria and the list of goalkeepers who have benefitted…
SOCCER THE seventh staging of the Wallace Cup and a glut of pre-season matches are top of the local soccer agenda. The 2019 Wallace Cup will be hosted by Baxter and will take place on Saturday 2 February. The annual event is a celebration of the local game and honours Stephen William Wallace, Langwarrin life-member and former club president, committeeman, coach, player and Bayside League referee who died on 19 July 2011 at the age of 54. Event organiser and Langwarrin president Tanya Wallace was disappointed recently when Casey Comets told her they would not be competing but NPL2 West…
SOCCER GARY Hodgson’s legacy to Frankston Pines may be the greatest gift of any president in the club’s history. He was the driving force behind a push that started off with a successful bid for a grant to build new female-friendly changerooms and ended with local council approval for a $3.4 million rebuild of the facilities at Monterey Reserve. Yet Hodgson sees things differently. “Unfortunately after seven years if you can’t attract people onto the committee … all we’d done was to help the club survive but we wanted to help it grow and we didn’t do that,” he said.…
SOCCER WILLIE Lynn and wife Liz have been involved with Seaford United since 1978 and have no plans to step aside soon. Willie is in the 12th year of his second stint as president having previously completed 10 years in charge while Liz has had several stints on the committee and turned her hand to almost every volunteer job at the club. “I’m the cleaner, the shopper and the washer upperer,” Liz said. “I wash both the kits for the seniors and reserves, I cook for them after training on Thursday nights and I help run the bar.” North Seaford…