Dunbar Rovers Juniors — Club History

Dunbar Rovers FC is a progressive football club located in the Eastern Suburbs of Sydney. Established in 1991, it now has over 800 playing members playing at all levels of the Eastern Suburbs Football Associations (ESFA) Junior and Senior competitions, as well as its representative teams playing in the FNSW NPL and GCL competitions.

In 2015, the club entered its Senior Men and Under20 teams into the NSW State League and won promotion at its first attempt into the FNSW National Premier Leagues (NPL). In 2017, it also entered Under13 to Under16 representative youth boys’ teams into the FNSW National Premier Leagues 2, and this year it will enter Under14, Under15 and Under17 girls’ teams into the FNSW Girls Conference league (GCL) for the first time.

At State League level, Dunbar Rovers have changed the football landscape by providing “Fee-Free Football” for all selected players based upon a sponsorship funded model.

Since 1991, the Club has established a reputation for high standards in, both its on and off-field behaviour, success in high ranking competitions, smart appearance at matches, and in the operation of a professionally managed organisation.

Dunbar’s first contribution to Junior football commenced in 2008, through an official charitable initiative via a partnership with the Football Project of the Indochina Starfish Foundation (ISF) www.indochinastarfish.org. Dunbar supports ISF in Cambodia, who work at making a tangible difference in the lives of impoverished children in one of the poorest regions of the world. Dunbar sponsors an Under14 Boys and an Under14 Girls team from Komar Rikreay (KMR) in the Battambang region. KMR provides non-institutional care and community nurturing for former ‘street’ and ‘trafficked’ children.

In 2012, supported by our sponsor Link Market Services, Dunbar established a fully sponsored free weekly program at the National Centre of Indigenous Excellence (NCIE) in Redfern, for local girls and boys aged from 4 to 9, as an introduction into football, in addition to running free school holiday programs for kids aged 5 and 6 in July and September.

In 2013, Dunbar entered its first Junior Under9 team into the local Eastern Suburbs Football Association (ESFA) competition and ran its own training hub for 20 young kids aged 5-7 players at Centennial Park on Saturday mornings.

Between 2014 and 2016 the MiniRoo and Junior player numbers grew to 175 players, from ages Under6 to Under13, comprising a total of 13 teams.

In 2017, the numbers grew to 230 players, and we fielded 17 teams in the ESFA competitions after moving our whole program for kids aged 5 – 14 to Queens Park, in order to enable all our Age Groups to be at the same ground on a Saturday, which made it easier logistically for the setup and for coaches to manage.

We also commenced running development teams in the older Age Groups (U14 and U16), to allow aspiring players to train with high-quality coaches, and bridge the gap to allow them to be developed for selection in future representative NPL teams.

Suffice to say we won both Grand Finals, 5 players moved into NPL teams mid-season in 2017, and 19 from of the 32 players across the 2 teams were selected for an NPL team in the 2018 Pre-Season trials. We also launched the Dunbar Community Football School, which was well attended every Wednesday by over 40 players aged 8 – 12.

In 2018, the numbers grew to 285 players and we secured a fantastic new synthetic grass training ground at Latham Park, South Coogee, on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday evenings, from 4pm – 6pm, to handle the growth in player numbers and provide a good facility for training with floodlights. We also run 6 Development Teams aged from Under12 to Under18 and started playing home matches at Moore Park West and Moore Park Synthetic field.

In 2019, the player numbers remained consistent with the prior year and our Development Team program successfully moved over 50 players to various NPL or Skills Acquisition Programme (SAP) teams for the 2020 Season.

We pride ourselves on being a true football development Club with a pathway to NPL. Our Under13 were undefeated and won both the Championship and Grand Final, our Under16 won the Grand Final, and all of our Development Teams made the Finals.

Dunbar’s point of difference is that we provide qualified coaches for every Junior team, unlike most clubs who require parents to step-up and volunteer to play the role of coach.

The program is directed by Christian Soares, our Brazilian coach who holds various senior coaching Certificates and a degree in Physical Education, with Diplomas in Sports Science and Functional Training. Christian leads his team of highly qualified Senior and Junior coaches and delivers a quality football program for all of our teams.

Our coaches have all undertaken Working With Children Checks (WWCC), and are required to increase their level of coaching qualifications each year so that we continually improve our standards and provide a better offering each year.

The MiniRoos program will follow the FFA Curriculum which is designed to offer a fast-paced, fun learning environment to assist a child’s development and build an everlasting passion for the game of football. The development program for our older Age Groups offers a semi-professional training environment 30-week Winter Season, aimed at improving players with aspirations of playing at a higher level.

To register your child’s interest, in either trialling for our Under9 to Under18 Development Squad teams, or joining our MiniRoos program for Under6 to Under12 Social Teams please complete the registration on the link below:

REGISTER HERE

If you have any questions, please email us or call Dunbar Rovers Juniors Director – Gerry Frittmann, on 0413 647 664, or our Technical Director, Christian Soares, on 0481 989 117 (please call between 5pm and 7pm on weekdays, or between 11am and 5pm on weekends).

Our email address is juniors@dunbarrovers.net.au