Restriped Zebras aim for next level

TASMANIA’S newest football club, the Clarence Zebras, had its official launch yesterday in which emblem and playing strips were revealed as well the announcement of David Smith as NPL head coach.

Co-presidents Nick Di Giovanni and Ronnie Bolton hosted the event at Wentworth Park, where they revealed the black home strip and red away strip for the inaugural season, a tribute to the merger clubs of Hobart Zebras and Clarence United.

“[It’s a] great day, really exciting,” said Di Giovanni.

“We’ve moved quicker than I thought we could with so much work from both committees. It was to and fro for a lot of meetings getting the colours right and the designs right which we did in the end.”

It was also confirmed that the Clarence Zebras will be playing in the NPL and Women’s Super League for the upcoming season as well as revealing the hopes for around 20 teams in Southern leagues across all age groups. “We’d have about 500 players I guess, for the first year. We had around 300 last year at the Zebras and Clarence had around 200,” said Di Giovanni. “It’s going to be a pretty big club.”

Football Director and newly appointed NPL coach David Smith is excited about the prospect following on from his role as NPL coach with the Hobart Zebras last year. “It’s an opportunity to deliver a football program across Southern Tasmania, it’s exciting for me. I’m looking forward to it,” Smith said.

“There’s a lot of player movement, a number of [Hobart Zebras] senior players from last year have moved on, some overseas, some interstate, some to different clubs.”

“There’s a number of Clarence players that we’re looking at, we’ve invited them to a couple of open sessions over the next couple of weeks.” said Smith.

The WSL team started training last night and former Clarence United player Mady O’Brien, who has verbally committed to the Clarence Zebras for 2020, is looking forward to the prospect of a competitive season.

“All the girls who were at Clarence [United] this year have got an open mind and are looking forward to a lot of hard work,” O’Brien said.

“Having Chris Hey [as a coach] next year is going to take it up that next level.”