While the numbers for this round have not been as strong as the first, club president Andy Ingold believes that they may have been influenced by some outside factors. 

“It’s been good, the kids have been enjoying it,” he said.

“With this program, there’s a lot less kids than we had in the first one. I don’t know if that’s because it was run in Yass, we couldn’t have it in Murrumbateman [due to the ongoing development of the Murrumbateman Rec Grounds].” 

However, what has stood out for Ingold is the improved support from the parents. 

“We’ve been lucky enough to get two parents to take over the coaching of it, to coordinate it

“Which frees the committee up to do other things, to get the club running better.

“It’s good to get the parents involved with the kids and get the extra hands on [deck] to run the program.”

This Auskick program is different from the first one that the MFC ran across October and November last year.

This session has run across six weeks, and Ingold says that it has been gratifying to see several of the children return from the first edition and continue to improve their skills. 

“Yeah you can tell the kids that have learnt how to kick,” Ingold said. 

“They’re getting the shape of the footy after they kicked it, they have improved. And the kids that’ve started this year have improved over the six week program that we’re just about to finish.” 

The reason for the extended program this time around, Ingold explained, is actually part of a bid to move some of the older kids into playing a full football season. 

“We wanna get to the point where we can have eight and nine year olds actually playing football of a Saturday morning, and that will go through winter,” Ingold said. 

“But to have them mixed in with the younger kids, we made the decision to have the six week program before the real cold of winter, and then we’re going to run another one in October-November.

“So the kids aren’t really cold of a morning. We don’t want young kids out there freezing, so we thought it would be better to run a progam before the winter and certainly run another one in the spring.” 

From here, Ingold said that the committee is planning on having one of its next Auskick sessions in early November, so it will coincide with their second AFL 9’s day and turn it into a real family event. 

The final Auskick session will take place this Saturday June 16 from 9:00am at Joe O’Connor Park, Yass.