Great Southern Storm hit by changes but coach remains confident they can challenge for maiden title at champs

Great Southern Storm coach Darrell Panizza believes his squad is good enough to challenge for their first colts title at the Nutrien Ag Solutions Country Football Championships in Perth starting on Thursday. The region’s most talented teenagers will represent the Great Southern Football League under the Storm banner and face a tough colts division featuring powerhouse teams Peel and South West along with Regional Districts, Pilbara, Great Northern and Northern Suns. The Storm have been forced to make several changes from their winning side at the Great Southern Colts Carnival last month, including the loss of Great Southern 20 member Saxon Henrickson. Key forward Clay Michael who dominated the recent carnival in Lake Grace is under an injury cloud, after hurting his knee for Railways on Sunday. The Storm have also lost Ben Kirkwood (work), Ben Altus (work), Kiya Jellay (illness) and Blake Panizza (collarbone) who were all members of the winning team. The side was hopeful of regaining key position player Xavier Brenton-Reed, who has made a mid-season move back to his junior club Railways after a stint with Claremont colts. However, he has contracted COVID and will not play in the two-day colts championships. The Storm will bring in four players from the Kimberley region, a move that has occurred for the last couple of carnivals as part of Claremont’s country zone alignment. Kassim Yeeda, Derek Padoon, Darcy Williams and Kyle Lawrence will make the long trip down from the north of the State and Railways youngster Lachlan Cale is another inclusion after not playing in Lake Grace. Panizza said the omission of a couple of key players brought more opportunity for his young and exciting group. “We will miss those players but opportunity is a great thing,” he said. “Someone else comes in and gets more game time. “We add four exciting kids from the Kimberley which is fantastic. “This is a very young group and when we put it together we did it with an eye for the majority of them being together and playing carnival football for the next two or three years.” Panizza said if the players could reproduce their effort from Lake Grace they would be good enough to win the silverware. “This is another step up, another challenge and we’ll need to be at our best,” Panizza said. “Now the expectation is there to perform, can they handle it? “We’ve never won this carnival, so it’s about making their own little bit of history. “In life someone always has to be first and it would be great for this group to be the first to win it.” Max Baker will be captain of the Storm for the championships. The colts division will be played at Lane Group Stadium in Mandurah and the Storm open their campaign against Regional Districts at 12.30pm on Thursday and then face South West at 3.30pm. On Friday they clash with Pilbara at 9am and then Northern Suns at 1pm. The colts grand final between the top two sides will be at 4pm on Friday. The Storm have also unveiled a new design on their playing jumpers and they have alternative strips, one predominantly navy blue and the other white. Great Southern Storm Team Ryan Lazar (Royals), Mohit Jaggi (Railways), Kassim Yeeda (Halls Creek), Derek Padoon (Bililuna-Kururrungku), Josh Davenport (Mt Barker), Max Baker (Albany), Lachlan Cale (Railways), Rory Luscombe (Royals), Kobi Keen (North Albany), Lorcan McNamara (Royals), Todd Brown (Denmark-Walpole), Ryley Valli (Railways), Darcy Williams (Broome Towns), Drew Willcocks (North Albany), Colby Law (Railways), Kyle Lawrence (Broome Saints), Tom Gawned (Railways), Joley Graham (Royals), Clay Michael (Railways), Sebastian Ballard (Mt Barker), Isaac Williams (Railways), Teague Valli (Royals), Jordan Hulm (Royals), William Cousins (Royals), Connor McCandless (Albany), Gus Bockman (Albany)