Rob Varela and four Futsalroos, who play for the Dural Warriors in the F League, took time out from their busy F League schedule on Saturday to meet their fans from the Pirates and Jaguars futsal clubs.

Starved of any international Futsal in Melbourne, it was a rare opportunity for the young players and their parents, to meet in person part of the team that performed so well in Dubai to qualify for the World Cup in Thailand. To actually train with these players, was an opportunity too good to pass up.

At the start of the session, Rob Varela, Greg Giovenali, Tobias Seeto, Jarrod Basger, Dean Lockhart and Nathan Niski were introduced to the packed gallery, who enthusiastically applauded their efforts at the recent AFC Futsal Championships in Dubai. Each player briefly spoke about different aspects to their futsal careers, including Greg’s time in Italy, Tobias playing in Spain, Dean playing for the Quake, Jarrod’s experience playing for Maccabi in the AFC Club Championships and young Nathan’s role at Dural Warriors. All have played for NSW Thunder at the Nationals at some point in time.

The juniors were organised into different groups and were allocated a Futsalroo each to coach them, whilst under the watchful eye of Rob. The juniors performed exercises in accurate passing, Oriented Trap, and checked runs. This was followed by conditioned games. At the same time Rob explained to the parents the importance of each component.

The afternoon ended with presentations of Joma prizes awarded by the Futsalroos and Rob, to various juniors from each age group. This included a Futsalroo jersey, kindly donated by Rob to one of the players. As a token of appreciation all the Futsalroos and Rob received a Waterford crystal glass, with Rob also receiving a Joma sponsored Spanish Inter Movistar shirt, which is his favourite club side, after Dural Warriors, of course! Special thanks to Anthony Rogis of Joma Australia for organising the Joma prizes.

It was a big day of futsal for the juniors of both clubs, as they took in the exciting games of the F League at Derrimut, followed by a session with their futsal heroes in the afternoon. All agreed, it was a great day and everybody is looking forward to the conclusion of the F League in Sydney and watching the World Cup on SBS in November. And who knows, given the enthusiasm shown by the juniors during the training session, one day we might see one of them in an Australian shirt. That would make these days all worthwhile.