Family gives its all for the ball

The Zijai family, back from left, Sermi, Yilber and Semir; and front, Ali, Sanih and Fillor, have had a massive impact at Endeavour Hills Junior Football Club. 33099 PIcture: Stewart Chambers

By Marc McGowan
“YOU should see our backyard football games. There are blood noses and all sorts of stuff goes on.”
No-one in the Dandenong and District Junior Football League would be surprised to hear the Zijai family get-togethers often get a little out of hand.
And that’s not because the talented Albanian sporting family is full of thugs.
It’s just that the Zijais’ competitive juices flow whenever they enter the sporting realm.
This spirited nature is on show every weekend during winter for Endeavour Hills Junior Football Club.
Four of them play for Endeavour Hills, including 16-year-old goal-kicking machine Semir, exquisitely talented 12-year-old Fillor, elusive 10-year-old Ali and eight-year-old dasher Sanih.
Sermi Zijai, father of Fillor and Sanih, is a former star junior footballer himself and now coaches the Hills’ back-to-back premiership-winning under-12 team.
Another member of the clan, Yilber, 15, played for the club up until this year before switching to Noble Park to try to break into Sandringham’s TAC Cup under-18 side.
He made the final 50 in the Victorian under-15 schoolboys’ squad, but has been unable to earn a spot on the Dandenong Stingrays’ development list.
Sermi describes Yilber as ‘a passionate Endeavour Hills person’, but said he had to leave due to a lack of opportunities with the Stingrays.
Two other Zijais – Ahmet, 18, and Ymet, 17 – also play for Noble Park.
“They’re very good kids; they’re very pleasant, easy to talk to and very humble in the way they go about their business,” Sermi said.
“But, above everything else, they just love the game so much – it’s all they talk about.”
Endeavour Hills president Mario Aiezza is in no doubt that the family has played a significant role in the club’s recent success.
“They’re all very talented kids; we’re very fortunate to have them,” he said.
“We’re a family club and have a very diverse culture here and I think we deal with that better than most clubs.”
Aiezza isn’t kidding – the club’s current under-16 squad won its fourth straight premiership last year with 14 different nationalities among them.
Sermi said that wasn’t a factor in his children playing at Endeavour Hills, but he couldn’t be happier with his decision.
“There is no club better,” he said.
“It wasn’t so multicultural at the time we started, but now it is and the club has welcomed them.
“The people there are so good and it’s a really professional club.
“Everyone seems to workreally well together and they’vegot such an understanding andall want to head in the right direction.”
Sermi’s brothers, Bash – father of Ahmet, Ymet, Yilber and Ali – and Ledo – father of Semir – have also enjoyed sporting success.
Bash played high-level soccer and was a half-forward/rover for the Dandenong Redlegs in the old Victorian Football Association, while Ledo used to compete for Dandenong Thunder in the Victorian Premier League.
So what is the secret to the family’s sporting achievements?
“It’s pretty natural,” Sermi said.
“If these kids really apply themselves or get the right guidance, they can pretty much be whatever they choose to be.
“Each and every one of them is extremely talented and have different attributes.
“Sometimes they’ll do things in a game and I’ll sit back and think ‘how did he do that?’”