Photo: Tommy Fotak at yesterday's announcement [Photo courtesy of New Town White Eagles]
Tommy Fotak
was yesterday announced as the new coach of Southern Championship side New Town
White Eagles.
Fotak will lead the club into its 60th anniversary year alongside
newly appointed senior assistant Adam Shackcloth.
A former White Eagles player, Fotak was most recently NPL coach
at Hobart Zebras. He returns to football after an absence focused on family and
the operation of a successful Tasmanian technology company.
Photo: Eagles president Grant Nutting (left) welcomes Tommy Fotak to the club [Photo courtesy of New Town White Eagles]
White Eagles president Grant Nutting explained: “To have an individual of Tommy’s quality
leading our club into its 60th season is extremely exciting. Alongside his technical attributes, Tommy
brings with him great character and his appointment is significant step towards
our club achieving great things in 2021 and beyond”.
Fotak said: “I am really
excited by the opportunity to build on the work that Dreamer [Andrew
Leszczynski] and the coaching staff have done over the past seven years.
"Performances on and off the field demonstrate this is a club on
the rise and that is a credit to Grant and the committee and everyone involved
at Eagles.
Photo: Assistant coach Adam Shackcloth (left) and Tommy Fotak [Photo courtesy of New Town White Eagles]
"I'm honoured to be entrusted with the responsibility to lead
this group and the club in their anniversary year.
"I can't wait to get out on the track and get to work. I encourage anyone that wants to be part of
the journey to come along and get involved however they can."
Further coaching appointments and player signings are expected to
be announced in the coming weeks.
Pre-season training will begin on Tuesday,
January 12th, 2021.
Photo: Eagles captain Andy Clark (left), with new coach Tommy Fotak and senior player James Vernon [Photo courtesy of New Town White Eagles]
I spoke to
Tommy today about his coaching background and the task he now faces.
Walter
Pless: Which clubs
have you played for?
Tommy Fotak: I played a season with Olympia
in the 1994/95 summer State League, but the bulk of my years were spent playing
with Eagles and Zebras.
WP: Which clubs have you coached?
TF: At senior level, Zebras and now
Eagles.
WP: Have you won any trophies as a
player, and as a coach?
TF: As a player, I won the
premiership with Eagles in 1998, Lakoseljac Cup with Zebras in 2003, and a
premiership with Zebras in 2004. These
were in competitions that were considered the top flight at the time. As a coach I haven't won anything at senior
level yet.
WP: Why are you coming back to
coaching?
TF: I've always enjoyed coaching and
wanted to get back involved at some stage. I see it as a way of contributing to community. For football to be played competitively, we
need coaches, referees, committees and match-day helpers, as well as players. Coaching is my preferred way of being
involved. It also engages my competitive
appetite! Timing is a big factor. I was thinking about what I would like to do
if I could retire tomorrow and, no joke, what came to mind in terms of keeping
me mentally active was coaching and keeping bees. No time is ever perfect and I realised that I
could do one of those things now, so why not? I had really good conversations with Eagles
and they understood my concerns about my time commitments with football, my
business and my personal life and they were incredibly open about working with
me to manage all that to try to ensure that we all get good outcomes.
WP: What will your coaching
philosophy be?
TF: I went back and re-read my
Coaching Manifesto I put together in 2013 when I first got involved in coaching
at senior level. It was a good reminder
of the ideals I have when it comes to coaching and the expectations I have of
myself and any group of players that I work with. From a playing perspective, I prefer
possession-based attacking football, but who doesn't? I love tempo football, being able to take your
foot off the gas, be composed, but when the moment is right, really apply
pressure and intensity for sustained periods. From a practical point of view, I want players
and supporters of the club to be able to objectively see that the team and
individuals - including myself - are
continually improving, that we are always moving forward, not necessarily in a
straight line, but forward nonetheless.
WP: What do you hope to achieve at
Eagles?
TF: Ultimately, the title and
promotion. That's what is being asked of
me and it's a fair challenge, and that's what I've joined to do. That will be based on hard work and continual
improvement. If we don't win the title
but we have improved by certain metrics, like total points or goal difference,
then that is progress.
WP: Why did you choose to go to a
second-tier side?
TF: In this case, the challenge of
promotion is a reason, but for me, it's not really about tiers. It's about where I think I can do my best
work, where I think I fit and add value and where I think a club sees value in
my efforts. A big factor was the
conversations we had around my time commitments in other facets of my life and
how we can manage that as a club and coaching group. Grant [Nutting] and the Eagles committee were
really understanding and supportive and we all believe we have a setup where I
can do my best work and deliver really good outcomes for the club.
WP: How do to rate Tasmanian
football at present?
TF: This is a really nuanced
question and any answer really depends on your perspective. The game has tens of thousands of stakeholders
and they each have different perspectives. My daughter plays AFL and I would say that at
a grassroots level football is streets ahead of AFL. Our challenge is to turn those fields of grass
into forests of trees, if I may wax philosophical for a moment. Pragmatically, the game faces all the same
challenges that other sports in this State face and I don't think we are doing
any worse or better than them. From my
personal perspective, I think as a whole, it is in a transitional period and
has been for some time. This is not a
criticism of any people in the game It
is due to societal changes that have occurred over the last twenty years. To move out of that transition we need to look
at our strengths as a sport and as a community and island State and aim for a
future built on the unique value those vectors combined bring. This is far easier to say sitting here than it
is to achieve in reality. Call me a
starry-eyed optimist, but I do think it is achievable.
Photo: Tommy Fotak has big plans for Eagles [PlessPix]