Tiarna Kinnear and Sam Murphy, at the NNSW Football State Championships in Coffs Harbour

Tiarna Kinnear and Sam Murphy, accompanied by coach and mentor, Shane Fletcher recently travelled down to Coffs Harbour to participate in Northern NSW Football’s TAP Camp (Talent Acceleration Program) and officiate at the Northern NSW Football State Championships for 12 Years Boys and Girls. They were joined by 11 other officials selected from the other refereeing zones in Northern NSW.

The week was used mainly as a development opportunity for the referees, giving them a chance to get mentored and coached by some highly credentialed referees coaches including State Coach and A-League Inspector, Ossie Bellamy, but it was also a chance for all match officials to impress and be identified for selection to represent Northern NSW Football at the Boys and Girls National Titles that would follow later in the year.

Each morning would involve a substantial breakfast before arriving at the pristine and immaculate BCU International Stadium ready for a full day of matches. After consideration by the coaches, all match officials were placed into ‘trios‘ in which they would operate for the duration of the tournament on a rotation basis so that everyone got an appropriate amount of time appointed in the centre. The other two members of the trio would act as the Assistant Referees.

After each match day concluded, the group of referees travelled back to the hotel and completed a cool down session in the outdoor pool. Each night was also accompanied by a debrief by Ossie Bellamy that outlined the positives and negatives of that particular day and some things he thought needed to be addressed by the match officials.

This experience was no doubt beneficial for not only Tiarna and Sam, but also Shane as well as he was able to communicate with Ossie and the other coaches/mentors at the tournament and see first-hand the latest refereeing coaching trends and techniques, and he can now bring these back to the referees in our zone.

Posted on Tuesday, July 13th, 2010 at 6:19 pm and is filed under Announcements. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.