\n The club has welcomed a talented group of academy footballers inside the four walls this week.\n <\/p>\n
The club invited 10 promising young footballers to Alberton this week to gain valuable insight into life as an AFL footballer.\u00a0Image: Matt Sampson.<\/p>\n
Port Adelaide has welcomed a group of academy footballers and their families to Alberton Oval for a \u2018live the week\u2019 experience to gain valuable insight into life as an AFL footballer.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In a continued investment in talent development in South Australia, the club invited 10 promising young footballers to Alberton, with plenty of surnames among the group already well-known to Power fans.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Visitors included Tevita and Maikeli Rodan (sons of David, who played 120 games for Port Adelaide), Louis and Max Salopek (sons of 121-gamer Steven), Percy Burgoyne (son of Shaun, who played 157 matches for Port Adelaide) as well as First Nations and multicultural teenagers Dougie Cochrane, Zack Young, Zemes Pilot, Mason Tambe and Archie Faulkner.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Zemes Pilot in action during the squad’s main training session. Image: Matt Sampson.<\/p>\n
Dougie holds\u00a0an\u00a0extra special\u00a0connection with the Power, with\u00a0father\u00a0Stuart\u00a0making\u00a054\u00a0appearances\u00a0for\u00a0the club,\u00a0and\u00a0older\u00a0brother Tom\u00a0making his AFL debut last\u00a0season.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The boys were integrated into the playing group from Monday\u00a0with\u00a0a tour of the\u00a0facility, before being\u00a0kitted out in Port\u00a0Adelaide gear\u00a0to join\u00a0training and meetings throughout the week.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Along with their families, they\u00a0were\u00a0also exposed to\u00a0a swathe of industry professionals to learn about nutrition, strength and conditioning\u00a0and\u00a0sports psychology, while also hearing from CEO Matthew Richardson and list manager Jason Cripps.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Academy coach Mark Clayton, academy\u00a0programs\u00a0manager Sean Lemmens and head of academies Shane Grimm led the\u00a0activities for the week, alongside Cripps, recruiter Robbie Gray, and national recruiting manager Geoff Parker.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis week is really important for us to connect with players and their families\u00a0within\u00a0our\u00a0academy system,\u201d Grimm said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cNot only do\u00a0we\u00a0want to\u00a0get to\u00a0know\u00a0these young men\u00a0really well,\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0a great opportunity\u00a0to\u00a0engage with\u00a0their parents and families, without whom, they\u00a0wouldn\u2019t\u00a0be where they are.\u00a0The education and experiences they have this week will help to equip them\u00a0to meet\u00a0the expectations of AFL football, should that opportunity arise in the future.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The boys were integrated into the day-to-day happenings throughout the week. Image: Matt Sampson.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have some incredibly exciting\u00a0First Nations, multicultural\u00a0and father-son talent\u00a0coming through\u00a0our academy, and\u00a0the significance of making them feel comfortable at the club from an early stage in their development can\u2019t be overstated.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dougie Cochrane and Zack Young are the oldest of the group and can nominate for the national draft in 2026, while Max Salopek is the youngest, and won\u2019t be eligible until 2029.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The club has welcomed a talented group of academy footballers inside the four walls this week. The club…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":414134,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85,83],"class_list":["post-414133","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-sports","tag-text"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=414133"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414133\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/414134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=414133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=414133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=414133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}