A favourite son of the Sunbury Lions has returned home for the 2024 season.
Former Richmond and Port Adelaide player Matt White will coach the Ballarat Football League side next season.
White was drafted out of the Lions and the Calder Cannons in 2005 pre-season draft to the Tigers.
He went on to play 153 top level games, kicking 98 goals across his career, including one goal of the year in 2014, before retiring in 2017.
Since retiring from the AFL, White has assistant coached at Victorian Football League club Coburg and played for Montmorency in the Northern Football League.
However, White won’t lace on the boots at the Lions as he replaces Travis Hodgson who is now coaching at Melton South in the BFL.
“It’s exciting to be able to say that I coach my own team and to say it’s my old local club, which is pretty special,” White said.
“It’s been good, I got to have a good chat with the leadership group and meet a lot of the boys, the message was pretty clear that we’re just going to go for it.
“I’ve got a pretty clear game plan that I’m going to try and get across to the boys.
“I’ll bring in some of my own ideas and hopefully we can just really launch into the season and have a very good year.”
Last season the Lions needed just one win from their final four matches to qualify for finals and were unable to do so, finishing in seventh. However, White said he was appreciative of the work done by Hodgson since his tenure started in 2019.
“I genuinely need to thank him for what he’s done at Sunbury and what I’ve inherited from him, he’s done really well with turning the list over,” White said.
“It’s a young group but it’s a group that really wants to learn and really wants to play good footy together.
“I think that’s the main thing, that they’re sticking together… they’ve kept almost the whole list from this year.
“We’ll try and top up with some other talent and really springboard off what Trav [Hodgson] had done for the club.”
Playing September football is the obvious next step for the Lions, though, White said he won’t cap the potential of his side.
“I think it would be stupid if somebody didn’t say that [finals is the goal],” he said.
“I’m not putting ceilings on what we can do but I will be putting a bottom end on what we can’t do.
“It’ll be between me and the players what we’ve got in store for the year, but we’re not aiming low.”
While in the AFL system, White played under three-time premiership coach Damien Hardwick, long-serving Port Adelaide coach Ken Hinkley, as well as the most recent AFL premiership coach Craig McCrae who served as an assistant under Hardwick.
“I had a lot to do with him [McCrae]… so I’ll be stealing bits and pieces from all of those guys and even the guys I’ve been dealing with at Coburg for the last two years,” White said.
