Staff Changes at MSA

Maribyrnong College and Maribyrnong Sports Academy would like to announce some staffing changes that have been made here at the academy in the past couple of weeks.

As we do with our Student Athlete’s, we encourage our staff also to strive for the best, and always look to better themselves in their career, and recently a couple of our staff have decided to do just that.

In our AFL department we have said goodbye to our head AFL coach Robbie Chancellor who has accepted a position with AFL club the GWS Giants in Sydney to be their Head of Development.  This has meant we have had to look for a new AFL Head Coach and we are pleased to announce that the role will be filled by Danny Sexton. 

Danny was coach of the Calder Cannons and Northern Knights in the TAC cup competition until 2006 when he joined St Kilda firstly as the club’s development manager, then an assistant coaching role before being announced as the Director of Coaching in 2016. Danny has also held the role of Footy Operations Manager at the Saints.

Meanwhile MSA AFL Coach & PE Teacher Hayley Gossow has accepted a role with the AFL as Head of the Girls program at the Western Jets.  Hayley will leave us shortly.

We wish both Robbie and Hayley all the best in their new roles and welcome Danny to MSA.

After the departure of our MSA Head of Strength and Conditioning, Calvin Pane to the Western Bulldogs, Todd Carlon stepped in as acting head of S & C for the second half of the year.  After a process which saw an amazing calibre of candidate apply for the position, we are proud to announce that Robert Le Guen has accepted the position of Head of Strength and Conditioning here at MSA 

Robert is qualified at the Masters level and his background includes being an athlete himself who moved from Melbourne to the USA on a College Scholarship which resulted in him being a member of a Lacrosse National Championship winning team.   Post College, Robert has worked in a variety of sports in the College system as an S&C Coach including soccer, American football, softball, baseball, track and field, basketball, golf, and tennis at both Hofstra University and the University of South Florida (both NCAA Div 1 Colleges).  

Robert has just finished working with English Premier League Club Manchester City as the Lead S&C Coach for the Youth Development Phase in its Academy program and has also worked with the English Football Association (FA) as a physical performance consultant.   We welcome Robert to MSA.

Finally, we also welcome Sara Hasani as our physiotherapist here at MSA.  Sara has been in the AFL system for the past 12 years as a physio at both St Kilda and the Western Bulldogs.

MSA Alumni WE 131122

While we didn’t have a massive amount of action in the past week for our MSA Alumni we still had some amazing results.

World Para Table Tennis

Congratulations to MSA Alumni Nathan Pellissier who represented Australia at the World Para Table Tennis Championships in Spain.  Nathan and his Mixed Doubles partner Lina Lei won a Bronze Medal – Nathan’s first medal at Worlds.   At the conclusion of the championships, Table Tennis Australia announced that our Australian team delivered their best ever results with many team members recording strong performances – Nathan had a career best as he also reached the Quarter Finals in the Singles, and Round of 16 in the Doubles. 

AFLW

North Melbourne was victorious over Richmond by 36 points to move into the preliminary final.  Monique Conti had 21 disposals and a goal for the tigers while Elle McKenzie had 19 possessions.  Both Elle and Monique were named in Richmond’s best for the game.  Meanwhile for the Kangaroos Amy Smith had 9 disposals and 6 tackles.

This week Amy Smith’s Kangaroos take on Libby Birch’s Demons for a spot in the Grand Final.  

Volleyball

Lorenzo Pope and his teammates at Modena Volleyball have jumped to 5th on the table in the Italian League after a solid 3-1 victory over Sienna.  

Taekwondo

As she continues her comeback from injury, we wish Reba Stewart good luck this week in the World Champs in Mexico.  This event is important to Reba as it gives her ranking points towards the Olympics in Paris in 2024.

Football/Soccer

Rhys Bozinovski started for Western United in their 3-2 victory over Wellington Phoenix on the weekend with Seb Pasquali’s return to the park not too far away.

Connor Metcalfe came on in the 81st minute for St Pauli FC in their 4 all draw against Karlsruher in the German Bundesliga 2.

Baseball

Congratulations to Keenan Spence who has signed with Purdue University in Indiana.  Keenan will play Baseball for the Purdue Boilermakers in the NCAA Div 1 Big 10 competition.

MSA Alumni WE 061122

It’s been a big couple of weeks for our MSA Alumni and current students.  Lets have a look at how they went.

Hockey

Congratulations to Connar Burns and Cooper Otterbach on making the final 18 squad for the Oceania Junior World Qualifiers in Canberra from 8-11 December.  We wish them all the best.

Takewondo

With 2 months of competition under her belt after a 4-month layoff recovering from a back injury, Reba Stewart has flown 80,000km to compete around the world. 

From a WT Grand Prix event in Paris, Reba went to Tahiti where she won 2 gold medals.  She is now home after just missing the quarter finals in the Manchester WT Grand Prix.  Reba next competes in Mexico.

AFLW Finals.

Melbourne v Adelaide

Melbourne had a 21-point win to go straight through to the preliminary final.  Libby Birch had 13 possessions, 4 marks and 6 tackles in the Demons victory.

Brisbane v Richmond

Richmond lost their qualifying final to Brisbane by 17 points.  For the Tigers, Monique had 15 possessions and 7 tackles while Elle McKenzie had 11 possessions and 5 marks.

North Melbourne v Geelong

The Kangaroos held onto to beat The Cats by 2 points in their Elimination final

Amy Smith had a breakout finals performance with 16 possessions and an AFLW record breaking 17 tackles.  Georgie Prespakis was gallant for the Cats in their defeat accumulating 14 possessions

Western Bulldogs v Collingwood.

The Bulldogs are out of the AFLW finals after losing to Collingwood by 5 points.  Jess Fitzgerald had 10 possessions, 2 marks and 2 tackles in the loss.

The AFLW finals continue this weekend with the semi finals where Richmond play Nth Melbourne and Adelaide take on Collingwood.

Also we congratulate Monique Conti, Elle McKenzie and Georgie Prespakis on making the initial 42 women squad for the AFLW All Australian team.  The squad will be cut down to a final group of 21 players and we wish our MSA Alumni all the best.

A-League Men

Rhys Bosinovski came onto the park at the 52nd minute mark in Western United’s loss to Adelaide United 4-2. 

Volleyball

Lorenzo Pope and his Modena team in the Italian Volleyball League had a win against Cisterna in the Supaleagua 3-0

Cricket

Year 8 student and 14yo Pearl Kapoor made her maiden half century in Premier Cricket playing for Plenty Valley on the weekend.  Pearl finished with 54no in the seconds at Plenty Valley, helping the team to their first win since March 2020.

Athletics

Congratulations to MSA Alumni Amelia Mazza-Downie on her championship victory in the Mountain West cross country event in a time of 19.39.3 over in the States. That makes it back to back cross country titles for Amelia.