Image: Paul Madej
Richmond have continued their transfer activity this summer with the addition of Swedish defender Herman Sillerstrom and goalkeeper Brandon Osipov to their senior playing ranks.
The 20-year-old Swede moves to Melbourne having spent all of his young playing career in his homeland, where he featured in defence as well as central midfield.
A junior at Kalmar, he moved to Division 2 side Lindsdals IF last year and was a regular under head coach Jonas Klippvik before electing to try his luck down under.
He had appeared for the Port Melbourne Sharks in a friendly outing recently but has moved to Kevin Bartlett Reserve and spoke to TCF upon his move to Paul Donnelly’s outfit.
“I am very happy to be in Australia as I think I am maybe the first Swede down here for football. I was in the youth set up at Kalmar for many years before appearing regularly at Lindsdals and am taking a different route by coming down here but hopefully it all works out.”
He is joined at the club by young goalkeeper Osipov, with the 18-year-old being brought in following the news that first-choice custodian Savas Ozdemir faces a lengthy spell on the sidelines having torn his cruciate ligament last week.
The 18-year-old is a Victorian state representative who spent two years in Canberra at the AIS before returning to Melbourne last year by joining Melbourne Victory Youth.
He made two league appearances under Vaughan Coveny last term and had initially agreed to join Bentleigh ahead of this season, only to depart the club in search of first-team football.
The duo join Ozdemir, Andrew Viola (Port Melbourne), Halil Gur (Dandenong City), Ryan Lambert (Melbourne Victory Youth), Marcus Dimanche (Melbourne City Youth), Rob Taylor (Doncaster Rovers), Hakeem Aloraibi (Goulburn Valley Suns), Gonzalo Freddi (Dandenong City), Baki Efe (Avondale) and Dillon Maikousis (Bendigo City) as new additions to the Alemannia dressing room.
The recruitment of the two new players is expected to further strengthen the playing squad largely assembled by Savas Saglam, the club’s technical manager.
Richmond open their campaign with an away trip to Bundoora to face Melbourne City Youth on Saturday February 4 in what will be Donnelly’s first competition game as manager of the club, having replaced the outgoing Rick Mensink this off-season.