A presentation was made in front of 480 people at Aami Stadium in the Magarey Room on Friday November 13.

Both coaches have been instrumental in the Lions Football Club’s senior colts success in recent years. They have the ability to see the big picture for the football club and understand their roles in developing players to play at the highest level possible.

Dunkley and Combe both have exceptional organisational skills and are keen to explore other options for their players, such as talking about recovery and healthy eating and by also gaining assistance from retired players and coaches with training to improve rucking, kicking and ball skills.

Their training is well planned with diverse ways of keeping the players interested such as recovery at the beach and fitness combined with drills that develop game sense and have a skill focus.

The coaches take time to talk one on one with their players and their knowledge of the opposition is second to none.

In a wonderful show of sportsmanship, during a game in 2009 when the opposition only had 14 players, the Lions coaches decided to play with 14 to make an even competition.

Dunkley is a level 2 accredited coach and Combe completed his level 1 coaching course this season and they both attended the National Coaching Conference this year in Melbourne.