FITTER AND FIRING

With football season postponed and training cancelled because of coronavirus, clubs from the North Pilbara Football League have to find new ways for players to keep fit.

The NPFL was meant to start on April 24, but because of the coronavirus pandemic, the West Australian Football Commission has postponed all community football competitions until May 31.

Karratha Falcons coach Craig Baker said his main focus was building relationships with the players and making sure their health and wellbeing was the first priority.

Baker said he had contacted the players over the past week .“In conjunction with our assistant coach Dean McDonald, we’ve had a few discussions around people and positions, and ideal leadership candidates,” he said.

“Really planning ahead as best we can but talking to each player about where we see them fitting into the team, and targeting a few key-positional training programs.”

Baker said he had been working with Sam Lee on strength and conditioning programming for players. “Some guys are going for a kick, going for beach runs, and we’ve had players come down and grab some exercise equipment,” he said.

Baker said football was nice to have but the players’ wellbeing and family come first.

“We’re treating their training as more of an outlet than anything, there’s no hard and fast ‘you have to do three sessions a week’,” he said.

Baker said by giving the players a heads-up on what positions they will play means they can provide them position relevant workouts.

“If someone is playing ruck,we don’t want them running 8-10km a night,” he said.

“It’s about getting that ball in hand and maintaining that fitness or build on it where we can.”

Baker said the postponing of the season was unfortunate timing for the club, with players buying into the new culture.

“For it to be pulled out from under us is disappointing but understandable as well, I know the guys are in contact with each other and are continuing to build that relationship off the field,” he said.

“We’re working really hard on the culture, raising our standards and setting higher standards of ourselves and our teammates.”