Gilbert named top coach

INVERLOCH’S Leonie Gilbert has been named the Victorian Football Federation’s female coach of the year.

Top coach: Leonie Gilbert has been named the Victorian Football Federation’s female coach of the year.

Mother of two Gilbert is the coach of the South Coast Stars Soccer Club’s female side for its two years of competition and has already led it to a semi final.
She began the journey to start a women’s team in 2012 with only two players who had previous football experience. Through her hard work and dedication, Gilbert was slowly able to build a squad of 21 players.
“The South Coast Stars big focus is the juniors and then it was going to put in a men’s team and I said we should put in a women’s team too,” she said.
“It’s really good for the younger girls to have these female role models and see people of any age can come out and have a run around.”
This meant spending countless hours teaching the game, improving skills and creating a positive experience for players of all skill levels throughout 2012 in readiness for the 2013 season.
Despite her commitment to the game Gilbert has only recently been a soccer player.
“I was a netballer growing up but my younger sister and husband both played soccer so I picked that up when I was 27 and absolutely loved it and have played on and off,” she said.
Gilbert’s dedication and coaching ability was evident throughout the team’s first season, and despite a slow start, her mantra of development, encouragement and fun led the team to third on the ladder and its first appearance in finals football in its very short history.
She said the whole community feel of the South Coast Stars makes it a great club to be a part of.
“The whole club focus is participation,” she said.
“From the juniors up it is all about participating and it is a really strong family club.
“Even at the senior presentation night we didn’t give out a best and fairest but instead everyone got an award.”

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Posted by Jacob De Kunder on Oct 29 2013. Filed under Featured, Sport. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry