Image: Australian Sporting Photos
Arguably the best signing of last year’s mid-season transfer window, 25-year-old Brunswick City midfielder Andrew Le Page is raring to go ahead of the Spartans’ opening round fixture against Ballarat City this afternoon at CB Smith Reserve. The 2014 NPL2 Championship-winner spoke about his injury troubles at Avondale, his time in State League 4, as well as his renaissance at Dunstan Reserve, having scored six goals in 12 league outings – including Goal of the Year contenders against Dandenong Thunder and Whittlesea respectively.
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DK: Andrew, take us back to September 2014. Avondale had just been promoted to the top flight following a meteoric rise up the State Leagues, with yourself being an integral part of Anthony Barbieri’s attacking line-up alongside the likes of Alex Khrapko and Jason Principato amongst others. However you suffered an injury upon achieving promotion which kept you out for much of 2015. Tell us a bit about that process and the long road back to the NPL you’ve had.
ALP: Basically the second last game of that year we were playing against Bulleen and I went down with an ankle injury. I tore three ligaments and broke one bone which pretty much restricted me to half a pre-season. I played the first three games of the NPL campaign and then against Port Melbourne I went into a 50-50 ball against Shaun Kelly and came off second best. It wasn’t a bad tackle but it was just awkward and had another ankle injury on the other foot which meant that I needed to have an ankle reconstruction.
I initially tried to come back from it without having a reconstruction that we were trying to put off until the end of the year but after eight rounds I tried to come back against Bentleigh in a 20s game and lasted only 45 minutes, so we decided to get the ankle reconstruction done pretty early and done straight away.
From there I went back to pre-season and ankle still wasn’t quite up to it so that was when I started to give it a bit of a break. I wasn’t going to play in 2016 but then decided to go back just for a bit of fun and went and played State Four with the Northern Falcons for about the first nine games of the year and that’s when I got the call from George at Brunswick who asked me what I was doing and told me to come down.
DK: Upon receiving that call, did you have any doubts or reservations about returning to play at such level given your physical troubles over the course of the previous 24 months and whether you would be able to overcome those issues and thrive once more in NPL2?
ALP: Definitely as even when I was playing State 4, I was getting to 50-60 minutes into the game and was barely walking. It wasn’t til about 3-4 weeks before George rang me that I was able to get through games. When he rang me I said to myself that I’d probably regret it if I said no, so I thought I didn’t have anything to lose.
I spoke to Anthony Barbieri about it at the time as he’s still someone I’m close with as I first joined him at Avondale when they were in State 2 and sought his advice along with a few others. They all said the same thing in to give it a crack as I had nothing to lose, and it’s probably one of the best decisions I’ve ever made as I’m back and playing at a level I want to be playing.
DK: That second half of last season with Brunswick saw you prove to be somewhat of an inspired signing with the club in general being one of the most in-form teams in the second tier. Tell us a bit about the momentum you guys managed to pick up because you certainly played a big role in the promotion race in both East and West with your performances against the likes of Dandenong Thunder, Kingston City and the Whittlesea Ranges.
ALP: When I arrived at the club it was a period of time when a few of the guys were going away on holidays and I think that was one of the reasons why George tried to get me in there to add a bit of extra depth. Basically it turned out to be a case of taking it game-by-game. On a few occasions we had two guys from the 20s sitting on the bench so we were really running thin on depth but even those guys who came in contributed.
For example, Jonathan Tsangas came on one game away to Dandenong City and won a 90th minute penalty which won us the three points. We were also a pretty tight-knit group and it reminded me a lot of Avondale as there wasn’t a lot of big scores and big wins but rather digging in and getting results while making it hard for teams to play against us and beat us.
DK: Looking ahead to this season, you’ve managed to retain the majority of last year’s playing squad while adding the likes of George McHeileh, Sebastian Mattei and Cameron Neales to the dressing room. What are the team objectives for this term and what is the overarching goal you’ve set yourself?
ALP: I wouldn’t say the word promotion is getting thrown around but I think deep down everyone knows that, especially after last year, if we all buy into what we want to do there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be aiming for it. Especially bringing in the guys that you have mentioned who will add a lot from the get go as their experience at this level adds a lot.
I’m looking forward to seeing Seb play again as I played against him as a junior and he is one of the best keepers in the state, so it would be good to see him find his feet again and dominate between the sticks. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t be pushing for promotion and I’d say the bare minimum is a top four finish, but we’ll see where the season takes us.
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George Karkaletsis’ Spartans open their season today at 3pm with a clash against Ballarat City at CB Smith Reserve with their regular home ground of Dunstan Reserve being re-surfaced.