REAPPOINTMENT OF CAREN FRIEND AS MWTA REFEREE DIRECTOR

Manly Touch continues to grow and a critical part of facilitating that growth is to accelerate the development of our Manly Touch referees.

It is with pleasure that we can announce that Caren Friend has rejoined Manly Touch as Referee Director.

Caren has had many years experience as a referee herself. She is also a previous Referee Director of Manly Touch, works closely with NSWTA and more recently is an active member of the NSWTA Referees Panel, leading the Level 3 upgrade panel.

Caren will be supported by senior our referee committee. This committee has identified key focus areas for development

Brandon Sanderson will take on the role of High-Performance Coach which will focus on the Level 3 and above referees obtaining higher badges and achieving their goals at tournaments. Brandon is one of the leading Level 6 referees in the world and has already been enormously helpful with the development of Manly’s senior referees.

Also supporting Caren will be Clive Elks and Tom Marsters who will lead the work on Junior Referee Development. This will include working with Referees to obtain firstly their Level 1 badge but then lead the coaching and course requirements for them to move to their Level 2 and Level 3 badges.

One of our senior referees Mark Hawthorne has also joined the Manly Touch Executive which will ensure there is a strong voice for referee development on the Executive to further support Caren.

Manly Touch Referees have prepared their own 3-year plan and you may be interested to know that one of their goals is to have more Manly referees in tournament finals than Manly teams playing in them. I am sure the players will take up that challenge and ensure that this goal is achieved by having to have many more referees in the Finals!

This is an exciting time for Manly Touch and its referees and we are very thankful to Caren for returning and dedicating her valuable time to us and also to all of the referees who are stepping up to help make our club stronger.

Kate Perrett
President, Manly Warringah Touch Association