Brisbane Roar is pleased to announce a 20-player group that will form the core of its Young Roar squad for next season’s NPL Queensland Men’s campaign.
Having made history with a top-four finish this year, there is bound to be plenty of excitement around Chris Grossmann’s side when the competition kicks off again in late February.
Several key members of last season’s run to the Semi Finals are returning to the fold with increased first-team training and match exposure under their belt.
New faces have also come in from other clubs while a number have stepped up from within the BRFC Academy, including Lochlan Johnston, Sam Keogan and Thomas Waddingham.
All will be looking to maintain the strong standards set in 2021.
“The bar has been set quite high for the group,” Grossmann said.
“It’s not purely about results. Results are nice because they keep motivation, they keep hunger, and at the end of the day we all want to perform, we all want to do well.
“That was a big motivator within the group last season. This season, a few have progressed from the Academy for different reasons which is always good.
“We haven’t really recruited from outside the Academy too heavily, and it’s not because we don’t believe in the young players at other clubs, it’s because we believe in the players we’ve got in the Academy and they’re deserving of opportunities.
“Yes we might be a little bit younger, but there are a lot of players who did extremely well in our Under 23s last season, who reached the Grand Final and were part of the Men’s team on a number of occasions.
“We’ll be giving them an opportunity in pre-season. I’m excited to see how they come and back and progress because it’s not going to be an easy pre-season. Consistency is going to be the biggest thing I’m looking for from a young group.”
The overarching objective for Grossmann and the coaching staff is to prepare players who go on to emulate the likes of Cyrus Dehmie, Macklin Freke and Alex Parsons by earning first-team opportunities and contracts.
“That’s our ultimate goal,” Grossmann said. “As an Academy, it’s our job to provide players for the first team that can come in and perform and give Warren some headaches. If we’re not doing that, we’re not doing our jobs.
“Winning is something I want to do. I didn’t win enough during my career, and I want to be a winner and develop winners. It doesn’t get any easier from here to get an opportunity as a professional player.
“It’s very, very difficult, so you need to be hungry, you need to be able to live in a dog-eat-dog world, and you need to be able to perform when there’s pressure on you.
“We want to play in big games and hopefully this season we’ve prepared a squad well enough to do that.”
BRISBANE ROAR YOUTH 2022 SQUAD
Goalkeepers: James Clasen, Lachlan Duke, Nick O’Connell
Defenders: Rhys Gray, Dom Horwood, Sam Keogan, Trent Millard, Alec Mills
Midfielders: Sam Klein, Brandon McMorrow, Josh Moreland, Jakob Mudnic, Louis Zabala
Attackers: Eli Adams, Luke Broderick, Josh Dimarco, Jake Ellenberger, Kane Gibbs, Lochlan Johnston, Thomas Waddingham
