Starting in his new role at Sunshine George Cross, former South Melbourne technical director Sean Gale brings vast domestic and overseas experience to the position. After touching down in Australia from Swindon five years ago, Gale was involved in the Coerver Academy before moving to North Caulfield Maccabi under the guidance of NTC head coach Boris Sheroshtan. FFV technical director Dave Smith then recommended Gale to Chris Taylor at South Melbourne, where after season at Lakeside he sought a new challenge, now finding himself at Chaplin Reserve with the Georgies.
Gale spoke to the Corner Flag about his experiences, football philosophy and vision for his new club.
Firstly Sean, what brings you to Sunshine George Cross?
I left South Melbourne in September, had a phone call from Sunshine, went and met with Vaughan [Coveny] and the president Jamie Chetcuti and I just got a good feeling from them straight away. There’s been a great footballing foundation laid by Vaughan going forward, he’s obviously involved with Melbourne Victory but he’ll still be around. It was a different beast to South Melbourne in terms of having a platform to build from. South Melbourne already has a ready made base they work from, and for me it was about being able to stamp my mark on Sunshine and build a legacy.
We share the same vision, they wanted to bring somebody to build upon the work already started, and I was looking for a club to be at for a while and get the club going. My objective is to develop the current crop of coaches that we have and hold onto them and in turn develop the players that we as a senior team have a big bulk of players coming through the system.
How does your experience with a club of South’s calibre now translate to Sunshine?
It was a fabulous learning curve, I learnt more in a year there in a club of that capacity where you have brilliant coaches around you, and the whole environment is ready made all the way down to the media team. It’s the attention to detail, the “one percenters” that made my experience special.
I bring high standards to Sunshine. The club is as it is, as soon as you mention that name, people have a view in mind of what it’s like. I now want to be able to bring something like that [from South Melbourne] to the club. It is a brilliant opportunity and the support system is different, from the initial meeting I had a good feeling and I wanted to work with people that shared my philosophy in building the game in general for Australian football.
What are the aims for the club and what has being done so far during your tenure?
We are looking to grow as a club and I’m looking to tie in the professionalism to Sunshine George Cross, from the media side to nutrition, injury management programs, leadership programs and building up the sub junior program. We want to expand in the right way, I want quality over quantity.
I’ve been overseas to form a partnership with a UK club, to which I need to finalise the details. I met with a couple of clubs to build connections. Coming back we’re now into trials and we’ve got most of our coaches on board. I’ve had a good opportunity to sit down with the coaches one-on-one on how I can assist them and how the club can help them achieve what they want to do in the future.
In terms of senior ambitions, would promotion be on the cards?
I don’t have as much to do with the seniors but its something I spoke with senior coach Tony [Ciantar] about working closely between himself, the U20s, U18s and U16s about building a philosophy where players come and want to play for the club because they know opportunities will arise and being a club that plays their youth. It’s hard to define in NPL 1 because there are no repercussions in terms of relegation, but you have to base your aims on what your means are.
But if we do our job right from now and from Vaughan’s work and build on it, then promotion and things like that we’ll be looking at. When things are more stable and we know we’ve got players coming through the youth that are playing the Georgies’ way, then hopefully the rest will follow.
What other objectives does the club wants to build on now and into the future?
We’re putting a lot of effort into the girls’ program. We’ve never been known for a women’s program, we’re starting with free women’s clinics for players in the area and building from there. We really believe in it. Before I came here, the club applied for WNPL but they probably won’t be ready for any three years in comparison to other clubs. We want to get there, we have a women’s team that we put together and we’ve got the foundation at the moment – the 15s, 16s girls that have got a lot of talent which could be playing seniors in the next year or two.
Sunshine is trying to make things happen, every club is catching up to the bigger club in terms of what they do behind the scenes with their support systems and volunteers, I think Sunshine need a bit more help but they’ve already got things going their way which is a great foundation for the future.