Get to know Football & Recruitment Manager, Josh Vella

15/12/2021

Get to know our Football & Recruitment Manager, Josh Vella.

For our featured article this week, we will be getting to know our Football & Recruitment Manager, Josh Vella. I interviewed Josh about his role at Sandringham Football Club:

What is your role at the club?

“Football & Recruitment Manager. I deal with everything football related for both the men’s and the women’s team. I also have a hands-on role with the recruitment of the VFL list of players for the men’s team.”

Why did you choose to work at Sandringham FC?

“It kind of fell into place for me after uni. In my last year of uni, I did a placement in which I had to do 120 hours, and I was lucky enough to get my placement through St Kilda Footy Club. I had a close friend who currently still works there, who was working in the IT department at the time, and he was able to get me a role there just doing 1 day a week. I was working there during the week, and I happened to sit in on a meeting with the Sandringham Operations Manager at the time who asked if there would be anyone around at St Kilda who would put their hand up to do some voluntary stats there on a weekend. I just happened to be in the meeting and I said I would. That’s kind of where it started. I was doing voluntary stats here for basically 2 years. The Operations Manager who was here at the time, was moving on to a different role and he told me I should apply for it, if I was interested. So, I thought, well I’ve been here for 2 years already doing voluntary stuff, I might as well put my hand up and see where it goes. I was lucky enough to get the position.”

“My Football & Recruitment Manager job has kind of evolved. When I applied for the job that was available at the time it was just basically an Operations Manager position. My role expanded from Operations Manager to Football & Recruitment Manager, which I basically proposed to my boss at the time, and the board, that I would like to move into that.”

What’s your 2021 highlight?

“For me, this year definitely the highlight was the opportunity to travel interstate to play. It was my first time and it was a lot of our players’ first time getting on a plane to play footy in another state. We went up to play Aspley, so we jumped on a plane nice and early in the morning, about 8 o’ clock I think our flight was, and we landed in Aspley 2 and a half hours later. We had about an hour and a half - 2 hours to prepare once we got to the ground and yeah, we played a game interstate. It was a really good game, back and forth in the last quarter. I think the lead changed 5 times just in the last quarter alone, and we just happened to be on the positive end of the result. I’d say that was my highlight from an overall 2021 point of view.”

What are you most looking forward to in 2022?

“I think a broad answer to that question would just be getting a full year of footy again. In 2020 we had no footy at all. We had a couple of false starts where we thought we were going to get a small season, and it stopped again and we had another wave of COVID and it all kind of canned itself. So that was disappointing for a lot of people involved.”

“The whole season was cancelled, so 2020 was a write-off in a football sense, and then this year was not completely a write-off because the girls just about got their full season out, and the boys got half a season out – which is obviously better than nothing. But I’m looking forward to getting through a whole year of footy.”

Who is you favourite AFL Player of all time?

“I’m an Essendon supporter, so my all-time favourite player is Matthew Lloyd.”

Who is you favourite AFL Player currently?

“My girlfriend's brother plays for Adelaide, so I should probably say him (laughs). So, my favourite current AFL player is Ned McHenry.”

Who is your favourite Zebras player?

“My favourite Zebs player is Goy Lok.”

Who is your favourite Southern Saints player?

“I put this in a Facebook post this year, so I should probably stick to it. Madi Capsalis.”

Who is your favourite band/artist?

“Just going to say Eminem (laughs).”

And lastly, what is your favourite TV Series?

“Good question . . . there’s some good ones. I’m going to say Breaking Bad”.

Written by Jye Pierce - Sandringham Football Club Media