Eumemmerring College students Andrew By Marc McGowan
TEENAGER Piva Wright leads four Year 10 Eumemmerring College students making a serious impact in Victorian football circles this year.
Wright joined Hallam school-mates Andrew Ray, Ben Cranston and Zach Smart in the Dandenong Stingrays’ under-16 team at last month’s Victoria Country trials in Bendigo.
The Stingrays were pitted against the Geelong Falcons, North Ballarat Rebels, Murray Bushrangers and Bendigo Pioneers.
Fifteen-year-old Wright’s performances earned him a place in the 48-man initial Victoria Country squad for the National Under-16 Championships in west Sydney in July.
He is one of nine Stingrays – along with Adam Ashton, Matt Buntine, Todd Elton, Matt Fairbairn, Adam Giobbi, Jordan Kelly, Dylan Shiel and Adam Treloar – in the preliminary squad.
Wright, who is Samoan but was born in Australia, trained for the first time with his Victoria Country team-mates in Torquay last weekend under former Collingwood star Nathan Buckley.
“It was pretty exciting getting selected for that level,” the Berwick footballer said.
“I just hope for the best with my footy and work hard and whatever comes I’ll take it.
“The national champs will be exciting because I’ve never been involved in something like that.”
Eumemmerring College sports academy director Ben McGee, who was on the Stingrays’ under-16 coaching panel, is thrilled for all four boys.
“All four of them got game time, but Piva was the one who did really well and was able to make Victoria Country selection,” he said.
“The other spin-off for the (sports academy) program is that Ryan Bastinac is the face of the program this year and for him to be captain of the Stingrays (at under-18 level) does wonders for our program.”
Tom Gillies and Shane Savage, who both played at the Stingrays, became the first two Eumemmerring College students to be drafted to an AFL club last year.
Wright hopes to join the pair in the coming years after what has already been an impressive junior career.
The North Dandenong resident has been in the Stingrays’ program for three years and won the Dandenong and District Junior Football League best-and-fairest award in under-10s, 11s and 12s.
Wright, who plays centre half-back or in the midfield, also won four club best-and-fairests during stints at the Dandenong Saints and Noble Park before switching to Berwick this season.
He started football after watching his older brother, Paul, 21, play and hasn’t looked back since.
“I watched my brother and saw him having a lot of fun, so I got involved too,” Wright said.
“I did play a little bit of rugby when I was young, but I found AFL a bit more of an active sport.”
He also has seven other siblings, Francis, 20, Jacinta, 19, Sarah, 14, Peter, 12, Robert, 7, Jackie, 3, and Daniel, 2.
McGee and the school’s AFL academy students are in Wodonga this week to play two games against Wodonga Senior Secondary College.
McGee is also keen to go one better in the Victorian Secondary Schools’ Sports Association football competition this year after finishing runner-up the last three years.
“We’ve also got our exchange up to Queensland later in the year and it would be lovely to try and have another draftee this year,” he said.
“We’ve got some potential with Ryan. Ryan is our only (Stingrays under-18) representative this year, but I’ll take the captain any day.”
