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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-09-20 Daily Xml
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COUNTRY FOOTBALL

Mr PENGILLY (Finniss) (15:29): Ma'am, I heard you mention football in Whyalla. I would like to talk about winter sports in my electorate, and say 'Go, the Crows!' before I start on that. I probably do not need to point out to many in this place, on this side anyway, that football and netball in particular are absolutely crucial to regional South Australia throughout the winter. If it was not for football and netball and what the codes achieve, we would not have a lot of social interaction in rural South Australia and, indeed, probably across Australia.

In particular, I would like to talk about this forthcoming weekend on the Fleurieu Peninsula. The netball finals finished last weekend and, unfortunately, Langhorne Creek beat Victor Harbor in the A grade.

Mr Pederick: Hear, hear!

Mr PENGILLY: Victor had won two in a row. You will get yours, member for Hammond. However, in the Great Southern League A grade football grand final this weekend, being held at Yankalilla, Yankalilla takes on Langhorne Creek. Hopefully, they can give them a flogging. Hopefully, they can give the member for Hammond's boys a flogging, but we will wait and find out on that. Langhorne Creek won last year and Yankalilla have certainly come a long way to get into it.

On Kangaroo Island, the football finals will be played. The netball finals were on last weekend on the Fleurieu but, this weekend, there are football and netball grand finals on Kangaroo Island. In the A grade, the Dudley United team is playing Parndana at Wisanger Oval. Parndana, I think, are running for their fifth A grade premiership in a row, so the rest of the island is pretty keen to see them get knocked off.

More to the point, football—and I want to dwell on football—is a wonderful, wonderful thing for young people, as is netball. It trains young people. I know, in particular, Donald Lade—the father of former Port Power player Brendon Lade—who is a football institution over on the island. He is absolutely passionate about getting young people to play football, to learn some skills, to learn some discipline and be taught a way of life. I commend Donald Lade on that.

It is part of the social fabric, as I say. It teaches them discipline, it teaches them manners, it puts some training in place for a future and, indeed, what you find with both football and netball—and I daresay soccer, hockey and whatever as well—is that they become involved in running the clubs, the leadership programs and committees, and really learn all about the country way of life.

I think it is just absolutely critical that sport be encouraged in South Australia. All the focus is on the big boys in the AFL or the not quite so big boys in the SANFL or soccer or whatnot but, if you did not have country sport at grassroots, you would not have a lot of these players coming through to play at senior levels. That is why it is worth spending some time in this place encouraging them and putting forward the fact that it is a wonderful grounding for the future.

I look forward to this weekend, as I say. Unfortunately, I will not be able to get to both games, but I know that Yankalilla people are preparing. They have a big working bee on there tomorrow to get their grounds and clubrooms ready and there will be a huge crowd there at Yank on Saturday.

Likewise, there will be a big crowd at Wisanger Oval. Wisanger Oval is the only privately owned oval on Kangaroo Island. The rest are all owned by the council over there, but Wisanger is proudly privately owned. I happen to be one of the oval committee that holds that oval in trust. It will be a good day and, once again, I wish the Crows well but, equally, I wish all people playing in country sports finals this weekend, of which there will be multitudes across the state, all the best, and may the best teams win.

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