Dean Grainger is hopeful Lalor can use the 2018 season to develop the next crop of senior players to push it back up the NFNL ranks.
The club has endured significant hardship during the summer – losing eight of its top-10 players from last year’s best and fairest count.
It follows two difficult years on the playing field, where the club has won just six games since falling to Whittlesea by three points in the 2015 Division 2 grand final.
The player shortage culminated in the club’s successful request to be demoted to Heidelberg Golf Club Division 3 for the upcoming season.
But with its playing future now secure, Grainger said his club’s focus had turned to being as competitive as possible in 2018.
“As a club, the goal is to be competitive and hopefully win games along the way and improve along the way,” Grainger told NFNL.org.au.
“You could say we are starting from scratch. We’ve got a lot of new faces at the footy club, added to the eight to ten senior players that have stuck around.
“My expectations are that we win a few games along the way and these guys develop into good footballers and hopefully in the next couple of years we can make our way back up to where the Lalor Football Club should be.
“I love the challenge for not just me, but the whole group that we’ve got, to turn things around and make it a respected club within the footy league again.”
Grainger has long ties to Lalor, having played senior and junior football at the club. His father is also a past president.
He signed on as Lalor coach in September and credited his playing group’s ability to fight through adversity during the pre-season campaign, despite, at times, an uncertain future.
“Before the decision was made the attitude of the guys to training was good, but there was also in the back of their minds the uncertainty of what was going to happen to the footy club,” he said.
“The attitude to what we were trying to do was fantastic, but if we had played in Division 2 with a lack of numbers we would have been beaten very convincingly each week.
“We put forward that we could go to Division 3 and be competitive and try to improve to eventually get back to where we should be.
“Once that decision was made there was just a completely different mood around the footy club.“There was excitement and it lifted the guys. The training standards really picked up, numbers have picked up and guys have approached us to come to play with us, which is a great sign for the footy club.”
Former Heidelberg and St Mary’s midfielder Isaac Edgar, West Australian tall Daniel Moore and Therry Penola key position player Michel Jacobson are among the new faces to join Lalor in the off-season.
But Grainger said he was looking for the club’s emerging senior players to also take a step forward in their development this year.
“The guys like Jackson Freebairn, Jake Langborne, Alex Dao – those sort of guys are the ones that we will be looking towards to take another step in their footy career,” he said.
“They’re the guys who have been setting the standard at training and their attitude has been fantastic.
“With their experience of playing Division 2 senior footy, if they can bring that to the table in Division 3, it is going to help the guys around them and help the vibe around the club to be competitive and grab a few wins along the way.”
Lalor’s preparation for its Round 1 match against Reservoir has included practice games against Diamond Creek and Westmeadows. The Bloods will also take on St Mary’s and Warrandyte in a tri-series on Saturday.
Grainger said Lalor was extremely appreciative of the support it had received from rival clubs during a difficult off-season.
“With what has gone, the support we have received so far outside our club has been amazing and it is so much appreciated by everyone involved at the club,” he said.
“Diamond Creek were fantastic in agreeing to play us in a four-quarter game to help us out and to have a hitout. It was a good hitout for our guys being our first one.
“Then last week against Westmeadows was a six-quarter game. Westmeadows had their reserves and under-19s in and accepted to play us even though their seniors had another game on. We appreciate the help that these clubs have given us.
“This week we have St Mary’s and Warrandyte in a tri-series so to speak. I’m good mates with Fab Carelli (St Mary’s coach) and Anthony McGregor (Warrandyte coach), who I played footy with over the years.
“We’re looking to have a really good hitout this week ahead of our Round 1 game against Reservoir the week after Easter.”
With just two weeks remaining until the opening round, Grainger urged all of the club’s supporters and past members to get on board for the 2018 season.
“We would really like the members and supporters who haven’t been around to come back as it’s going to be an enjoyable place,” he said.
“Be patient with us because it will be a young group and we are sort of starting from scratch again.
“We want to get back to that level where the members and supporters come back and we urge them all to get on board and be part of the journey we want to be on moving forward as a football club.
“A few of the older players have been amazing in their support for me. Steve Petruccelle, Shane Watts – I’m constantly on the phone to those guys. Darryl Sinclair, legends of the footy club who I grew up watching and was lucky enough to play with them as a 16, 17-year-old.
“Their support of the club has been amazing and if we can get the some of the older blokes back who played with those guys it’s going to be a really good vibe around the club and a good place to be.”
