Festival of Football to showcase Pilbara talent

Football in all its forms is set to be celebrated with a 10-day Festival of Football in Karratha next week.

The first-time event will feature a packed program of representative all-stars games, training clinics and school visits for teams and officials across the Pilbara, including Karratha, Roebourne, Tom Price, Paraburdoo, Hedland and Newman.

It has been organised by the WA Football Commission and the City of Karratha, with support from Rio Tinto, headspace Pilbara and various local football stakeholders.

WAFC Pilbara regional manager Vicki Agnew said the festival would be a showcase of the high standard of football in the Pilbara.

“It’s a 10-day event of celebrating football and we’ve got something happening every day that’s football-related, culminating in a massive weekend of representative football and coaching courses,” she said. “Every form of football is being covered over those 10 days, and it allows us to showcase our facilities, our kids and their talent and give the kids and officials opportunities they don’t always get.”

Senior men’s, women’s, masters and junior football will all have dedicated events as part of the festival. There will also be training opportunities for coaches, umpires and volunteers.

Agnew said talent scouts would also be attending some events, giving players an opportunity to be identified for higher-level development.

Headspace will run mental health and wellbeing workshops for clubs and players as part of the community effort to address the above-average number of suicides and self-harm incidents in the region over the holiday period.

Agnew said football in the Pilbara was well worth celebrating with such a festival.

“We’ve got some amazing people with some amazing skills here, and we need to celebrate and reward them,” she said.

“Not everyone’s going to make it into WAFL football but we’ve got some bloody good footballers and clubs here and we need to showcase them.”

For more information on the events that are part of the festival, go to the City of Karratha Festival of Football event page.