Quote Originally Posted by plague View Post
does anyone on here have kids involved in these programs (Richard Hartley etc).
Does anyone have an idea of cost/facilites/amount of training.

i have no idea about the bloke but man oh man his name comes up A LOT in conversations about junior development.

would love some real feedback if anyone has it.
Ok...

RH in conjunction with Newcastle football set up the original Net system which is much like SAP now so as to get a lot more kids at a higher level. At the time there was a different SAP comp which comprised of Newcastle, Macquarie, Hunter and other further regional teams which left a lot of good local players with no other high skill path.

So around 8 to 10 local NPL/1 clubs formed and developed highly trained u10/u11/u12 comps playing each other during winter over 14 rounds, usually all at Wallarah oval Lambton.
These teams trained 2/3 nights a week and were/are considered elite as their results in State cup showed. It still runs now along side SAP. It is around 1/2 the cost of SAP but has less rounds.

I know 2 clubs who pick their Net teams who just missed out on SAP although that doesnt mean lesser players in real terms. The kicker is after the winter comp they then play a summer comp (usually with some different team setup) from Sep to Nov which is quite well priced.

Im sure there are greater details etc.