Matthew McNamara has spoken of his desire to lead Brunwick City towards a successful NPL future after his appointment as the club’s technical director.
He takes the reigns after the Dunstan Reserve outfit experienced a tough initiation into the NPL, struggling to climb off the bottom of the ladder in the first two seasons of the competition.
It may be a case of third time lucky for City, which has signalled its intentions to improve its standing both on and off the pitch with a number of prized recruits, including McNamara.
“I caught up with the committee and they sold me with the club’s ambition and vision, where they wanted the club to go, and the opportunity to start with a blank canvas and stamp my own authority and influence on the club,” McNamara said.
“I’m the first to acknowledge that the club has struggled in the past. For me and the club it’s about starting fresh.
“Season three brings with it plenty of change in terms of coaching staff, so with all due respect to the people that have been there in the past, they have done the best job to their ability but we decided to make a host of changes for the upcoming season and every position from the U20s to the U12s has been changed.”
McNamara joins after holding a number of positions at different clubs in the past two seasons.
The former Goulburn Valley assistant and Hume City youth coach has also had experience as a technical director at Cairnlea FC, and stepped in for the suspended Nick Kalafatis to lead the Suns’ first team in an FFA Cup game against Heidelberg United.
Now in his first NPL technical director role, McNamara praised his support staff at Brunswick City, saying the club had made it a priority to bring in quality individuals to nurture a new era at Dunstan Reserve.
“We’ve gone out and recruited some top coaches who are very well qualified,” he said. “We’ve bought in some great people.
“Sebastian Sztormowski works within the FFV as a coach coordinator, he’ll be in the U16s.
“Peter Catsourakis is someone who I’ve worked with as well, joining in the U15s and doing an apprenticeship Under Rick [Riccardo Marchioli] in the U20s as an assistant, which is fantastic.
“Me and Rick have known each other for a long time, I heard he was looking to coach his own team instead of work in a technical director role, I made sure I found him the most suitable role to get him on board, he’s a fantastic young coach and has a lot of ability.
“We’ve also brought in George Karkaletsis as the first team coach who has brought so much success to this club in the past and has also done a B-License.”
McNamara is in the final stages of completing his A-License, and will put his expertise to practice to develop a consistent philosophy across the whole club with his backroom staff.
It’s part of a process that McNamara believes will help City – a former home to Theo Markelis and George Mells – attract and develop higher calibre players and allow the club to push for league honors in the future.
“I’m currently going through the process along with the head coach and some of the other coaches to develop the “Brunswick way” you can call it,” McNamara said.
“We’re sitting down to develop our own football philosophy of where we see the club’s footballing style to be, we want the style to be consistent all the way from the first team to the U12s. We want everyone playing the same way with similar patterns of play throughout the game so they can progress to the first team.
He added: “The board has been fantastic in giving me a blank canvas to work from. John Karavetis, the football operations manager, has been extremely supportive.
“For me at the moment it’s about bringing the right coaches, we’ve taken that step forward, and I think the saying “if you build it, they will come” is true.
“We haven’t had have the calibre of players that other clubs do, but I’m confident with the coaching staff we’ve employed, that over the next couple of years we will see our club grow.
“They’ve entrusted me to complete the rebuild and so far we’ve only started that journey.”