Daniel Cencic | News Sport Network
Boronia Hawks FNC has hit the off-season signing one of the most exciting young talents fresh from the VFL – but there are several more boxes Boronia must tick ahead of 2026 according to coach Matt Clark.
Recently securing former Eastern Ranges star Jake Arundell, the Hawks’ headline addition joins full-time after three seasons with Box Hill in the state league. A glittering underage career was capped off with the under-17 Eastern league best and fairest, before a stop at SANFL outfit South Adelaide.
It’s understood the 22-year-old’s signature was highly sought-after among local clubs after stepping away from the VFL.
“He’s got connections with (Boronia players) Mitch Mellis and Kieran Edwards, and Jake Mellis too. We got the hint he was thinking about coming back full-time and he was willing to explore that,” Clark said.
“We were able to share a couple of stories on people like ‘Begs’ (ex-VFL and AFL player Josh Begley) who came back to play local footy and fell in love with the game again.
“He’s looking for opportunity to be a midfielder – he’s got pace and skill. He’s a quality person which we look for first and foremost.”
Former junior Matt Barkas has returned after a stint at top-division club East Ringwood.
“He’s a one-pointer coming back and he’s another good ball-user – he’s played across the wing, half-back, half-forward. He’s really keen to get back and get involved – he’s got a lot of mates at the club,” Clark said.
Meanwhile, Eastern league legend and Bayswater great Joel Galvin has jumped on-board as a senior assistant, following three EFNL competition best and fairests, 300 games, five club champion awards and two premierships.
And there could be more recruits headed to Tormore Reserve in the coming weeks. Boronia finished the home-and-away season in fourth with a 9-7 record, before a first-week finals exit at the hands of North Ringwood.
Clark said there were several lessons to learn from the club’s maiden Division 1 season following consecutive Division 2 flags.
“The evenness of the competition, the mindset you’ve got to take into every game and how strong you’ve got to be,” he said.
“We found the year before (in Division 2) you could probably be off by five or 10 per cent and still do enough in a quarter to win it. Just switching off for a moment (in Division 1), you’ll get scored against.
“For us, just having some bigger bodies – not having under-19s for five years, we were really exposed with some players who probably weren’t physically strong enough to play at that level.
“We’ll be really keen on getting our current list stronger, and that was spoken about even after the last game about the need to get into the gym and become more resilient.”
: wayne.judge@edumail.vic.gov.au
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