Bat Pad wrote:The issue with Mt Barker and two sides is that there are so many towns with football sides in close proximity to Mt Barker, unlike for example a Mt Gambier or Pt Lincoln. So just because you live in Mt Barker doesnt mean you play for them. A fair few players in both divisions played junior footy at Mt Barker and moved onto to other clubs, even after junior primary footy because they had mates there and it was easy. Thats why Mt Barker, even with it's large population, only has the one side. IMO another club isnt required, because if you have a little tacker who wants to play footy and you live in Mt Barker, and Mt Barker has too many numbers, its not a big deal in terms of travel for them to play at Hahndorf, Echunga, Nairne etc. Perhaps someone from barker can comment on whether kids are missing out on a game of footy at the moment at Howard Lane...
Going by numbers this year we have full teams in the following, 2 x u8, 1 x u9, 1 x u10, 1 x u11, 2 x u13, then we have 29 for the junior colts (4 missing out each week) and 27 senior colts ( 5 miss out). In the senior squad there are currently 3 players missing out on b's and our injury list is currently at 11, of those 8 are current A graders. Our C's struggle to fill a complete team but have 13-15 out as a minimum.
I think you will find that with the amount of juniors coming through and lack of retirements in the next 5 years (age wise only 5-6?) we will start to develop a country div team for each grade. Maybe not next year but in a couple of years time. 150 junior primary players at the moment...should see at least a minimum of 20% make the senior squad in the next 5 years.
By this time the new oval will be up and running and country div. will probably play at howard lane. This has been spoken about at the committee meetings for a while and that steps are in place to deal with this in the very near future.