THE future of the Nangwarry Football club looks brighter than ever following the announcement of $200,000 in Federal Government Funding to support the rebuild of its clubrooms.
It has now been over two months since a suspicious fire completely destroyed the football clubrooms and all the memorabilia housed inside.
The funding announced by Member for Barker Tony Pasin on Wednesday, is the latest financial boost for the club, which has vowed to “carry-on” despite the unforeseen circumstances they were faced with in January.
After an overwhelming outpouring from the South East community, club president Shane Ploenges said the federal funding was the “icing on the cake”.
“It basically gives us a chance to look at all the available options for a new facility,” Mr Ploenges said.
“We are so thankful to everyone right across the Limestone Coast for supporting out football club.”
Club legend Kevin Dinnison said the grant would go a long way to completing the rebuild of a new facility.
However, it is currently unclear when the rebuild will start as the club awaits the outcome of their insurance claim.
“Obviously we hope to get something up as soon as possible, but we have to wait on the insurance company and then we will have to find an architect to design the new building,” Mr Dinnison said.
“It is still a little way off, but once the ball gets rolling, it should progress pretty quickly and I’d be hoping something is up around this time next year.”
Mr Ploenges said they would not rush the process.
“There is no way we could have got something up by the end of this year, so we will take our time with it,” Mr Ploenges said.
Despite the unknown timeline, Mr Dinnison said he was already excited to see the ideas the committee come up with for the new clubrooms.
“We have the chance of a lifetime to get what need for the future – a modern building for our club and our town,” he said.
“It’ll definitely be exciting when the concrete slab goes down and the framework goes up.”
Mr Pasin said he was thrilled the funding would be able to help the club achieve their goal of rebuilding as swiftly as possible.
“In Nangwarry’s case is not a matter of upgrading – it’s a matter of rebuilding this vital piece of infrastructure from the ground up,” he said.
“The club and its 54 year history really is the heart of the Nangwarry community and I think I speak for everyone in the South East when saying I want to see it rebuilt as quickly as possible.”
Mr Dinnison said plans were already in motion to recover and reproduce some of the 54 year history, which was lost in the blaze.
“It looks like the big premiership photographs can be reproduced as the negatives are still available,” he said.
“Replacing the honour board and things like that will not be a problem.”
With everything starting to take shape off-field, Mr Dinnison said there is also a positive outlook on-field in 2019.
The Nangwarry Football Club is desperate to sing the team-song, having not won an A grade fixture in the past four years.
“We have picked up a few players and we definitely hope to be a lot more competitive this year,” he said.
