All eyes on Easter Saturday footy in Lorne

GEELONG Football Netball League reigning premiers Leopold will play its first match of the season in the inaugural Lorne Game at Stribling Reserve tomorrow (Saturday, April 19) at 2.10pm.

In the only GFNL senior match of the weekend, the Lions will battle St Joseph’s, who defeated Newtown and Chilwell by 35 points in round 0 a fortnight ago.

It shapes as an enthralling contest given Joeys made the preliminary final last year, and will be coach Luke Kelly’s first match in charge of the Lions after replacing Garry Hocking.

Kelly said Leopold had an intraclub match during their pre-season camp at Stribling Reserve about three weeks ago.

“It’s like a mini colosseum in Lorne, which is great.

“Hopefully the crowds turn out on Saturday.

“Anytime you can shine the spotlight on community football and gather big crowds, it’s always a great opportunity and one that should be taken.”

Kelly recently returned home to Geelong with his young family after a three-year stint as an assistant coach at Port Adelaide.

He has taken the reins of a team chasing a three-peat and they are the only side yet to play a game this season.

Kelly said that while the group had been itching to go since footy returned, there had been advantages of the later season-opener.

“The beauty for us is we started (pre-season) a bit later just because we’ve gone deep the past two years and they’ve had some pretty big workloads,” he said.

“We were able to freshen them up a little bit longer.”

Kelly said key forward recruit Henry Hawker would miss Round 1 after injuring his shoulder in an intraclub match.

Action at Lorne will start with the under-18s at 10am followed by the reserves at 12 noon.

There is no parking available around the ground and no netball will be played.