Eagles flying on the national stage

 

The Rio Tinto AFL Woomeras Leadership Program began yesterday (Tuesday), with two players from Kempsey in attendance.

Maleah Waters-Holten and Mattarley Kelly-Scholes join the program as a part of the Rio Tinto AFL Woomeras squad and are in Melbourne for the six day camp.

Maleah and Mattarley were selected based on the quality of their performances for the NSW/ACT Kickstart team which competed at the AFL National Diversity Championships held in Byron Bay in October last year.

Currently in its sixth year, the Rio Tinto AFL Woomeras team is the national Under 16 female Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander development program. The Woomeras are joined in Melbourne by the Medleys, which is the national Under 16 female Multicultural development program.

The camp focusses on personal and cultural development and high performance training.

The program will see the Medleys and Woomeras participate in sessions including cultural education, nutrition, mental health and building team values. Held separately, each respective program will tour and train at AFL clubs before coming together to compete in two exhibition matches.

The Woomeras will play against the Medleys in a match on Thursday 15 March at the Richmond Football Club and on Saturday 17 March at Victoria Park. It will be only the second time an all-Indigenous girls’ team will play an all-Multicultural girls’ side in an official match.

Both Maleah and Mattarley play their club football with the Macleay Valley Eagles club, which is based at South Kempsey Oval. Registrations are currently open for the Youth Girls team, along with Under 11, Under 13, and Under 15 teams.

For more information about the Macleay Valley Eagles contact President Paul Lang on 0421 484 698.