Warrnambool Tournament Underway
The 2010 Annual Seaside Tournament in Warrnambool sees some more success from the Falcons Women. The Honours team has finished the round robin stage in 2nd position and will play a semi-final at 4:45pm this afternoon for a shot straight into the final.
The Div 2 team finished top of their pool, and are playing at 6:00pm tonight for a direct route into the final.
The Div 3 team remain undefeated at this stage, and have a few more games left to hopefully round out the great performance by the womens program.
The Mens Honours team is a fairly fresh team and have gained some valuable experience as a team and playing against some high level clubs from around Victoria and South Australia. Unfortunately they have not won a game yet, but some of the younger players have shown some great improvement ahead of the Victorian State League season.
Updates to come as they come in.
More Falcons in 2010 State Training Squads
Another successful year for Falcons Juniors representing their state in the upcoming 2010 Junior Nationals Volleyball Tournament in Perth.
Those making the squads are:
Boys
U16
- Luke Brisbane
- Drew Waters
- Perry Mitchell
U17
- Chris Brown
- Aaron Morrow
U19
- Sam Brisbane
- Jordan Richards
- Coach: Grace Sobolewski
- Assistant Coach: Liam Sketcher
Girls
U16
- Elsie Rodgers
- Assistant Coach: Bill McHoul
U17
- Ella Heaney
- Hannah Williams
- Coach: Bill McHoul
- Assistant Coach: Petrice Fatchen
U19
- Angelique Doulgeris
- Jaimie-Lee Morrow
- Sophie Paine
- Monique Stojanovic
- Stephanie Topp
- Assistant Coach: Erin Ross
U21
- Jacinta Cook
- Danielle Horne
- Jess Lampe
- Lena Skipper
Congratulations to all those who attended the trials and good luck to all those playing in Perth in July.
Mens training cancelled tonight
Due to an issue with MSAC, this evenings Mens training session has had to be cancelled. Personal fitness is expected. See you all next Monday
2010 Melbourne Falcons Coaching Structure
The Coaching structure for the club for 2010 has almost been finalised, but there are still a few positions available if you would like to be involved in coaching Falcons teams this year.
| Position | Mens | Womens |
| Head Coach | Phill DeSalvo | Bill McHoul |
| Division 1 | position available | Grace Sobolewski |
| Division 2/Juniors | Liam Sketcher | Petrice Fatchen(1 more position also available) |
| Mentor Coach | Allan DeSalvo | Allan DeSalvo |
| Manager | Michael Robertson | Bill McHoul |
If you would like more information, please contact Bill (bill(at)i.net.au) or Michael (“Robbo”) (michael(at)mjrphoto.com.au)
Mens Pre-season Training
After a great turnout and solid session at the first of the mens pre-season trainings tonight, the boys are ready to take on another big year! For the remainder of pre-season, trainings will be as follows:
- Monday 7pm – Ivanhoe Grammar – The Ridgeway, Ivanhoe
- Thursday 7pm – Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre – Albert Park
These are for the Seniors in the mens program. Junior training will start on Tuesday nights at Luther College in a few weeks.
See you there!
Falcons Men name new Head Coach

We are proud to announce Phill DeSalvo as the new Head Coach for the Mens program in 2010.
Phill joins the club after representing Australia as Libero in the senior team for 150 games and junior team for 100 games. During this time he competed in the 2003 Youth World Championship (ranking 5th as individual best digger in the tournament), 2006 World Championships, 2007 World Cup, and was also part of the team who were 2007 Asian Champions and also 2007 Commonwealth Champions. This national team was also ranked 11th in the world in 2007. He was also part of the Olympic Shadow Squad in 2004 and 2008.
Over the recent years Phill has been playing professionally in Germany and the Czech Republic. He played for:
- Sonneberger Volleyball Club – Germany (2nd Bundesliga)
- Volleyball CZ Kladno – Czech Republic (Czech Superliga)
- Volleyball CZ CZU Praha - Czech Republic (Czech Superliga)
- Volleyball SG Eltmann – Czech Republic (1st Bundesliga)
Phill has now come back to Melbourne for study, and has great plans for a revamped Mens program in 2010. This year Falcons should be represented in Honours, Division 1, Division 2 and Junior State league in the mens competition.
Falcons win Silver at National Junior Beach Titles
Falcons girls Jamie-Lee Morrow and Monique Stojanovic (“Team Falcon“) won Silver in the Girls U19 competition in the National Junior Beach Volleyball Titles last week in Adelaide.
In the U17 boys competition, young Sam “Vegas” Brisbane also won Silver.
Congratulations to all the Falcons who competed in Adelaide! Hopefully this is the start of a great year!
Time to take on the 2010 season!
Well its now that time of the year to start getting back onto the hard court. Both the Mens and Womens programs will be starting preseason over the next few weeks so it’s time to get back into shape (if you over-enjoyed your Christmas season, like me) and get ready to take on the 2010 State League Season.
Please check out the following documents for all the latest information:
Mens Program
Womens Program
Falcons take on Australian Schools Cup
Next week sees the Australian Volleyball Schools Cup come back to Melbourne for the 2009 week of competition. The games will take place at Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre along with the State Volleyball Centre in Dandenong.
The games start on Sunday the 6th of December and go through the week, with the Finals being played on Friday the 11th of December.
There are a huge number of Falcons taking part in the competition, so we wish Good Luck to the following boys:
Representing Billanook:
- Aaron Morrow - Under 16 Honours
- Drew Waters – Under 15 Honours
- Kalan Davenport – Under 15 Honours
- Tom Dettman – Under 14 Div 1
- Darcy Rodgers – Under 14 Div 1
Representing Eltham:
- David Fletcher – Open Honours
- Sam Brisbane - Open Honours
- Jordan Richards - Open Honours
- Luke Brisbane – Under 15 Honours
- Matt Lester – Under 15 Honours
- Nathan Dorman – Under 15 Honours
- Tom Ross – Under 15 Honours
- Cale Skidmore – Under 15 Honours
There are just too many girls to list so we wish good luck to pretty much all of our Womens program who are under the age of 20 along with all of the volunteer coaches who are coaching school teams.
We advise everyone to try and get down to MSAC or the State Volleyball Centre next week to support all the kids and see some great School Volleyball. See you there! For full Draw/Results details check out the 2009 Australian Volleyball Schools Cup page.
Also a big congratulations to all the Eltham juniors who participated in the Victorian Secondary Schools Sports Association Volleyball Cup last week. Eltham managed to get 4 competition wins out of 4 teams entered. The year 7 and 8 boys and girls teams featured a number of Junior Falcons, who will go on to the National Schools Cup Competition next week! Well Done Guys!
Falcons Junior Boys Return to the Mix

Over the Melbourne Cup weekend, the Falcons Junior Men’s program reached it’s culmination by participating in Division 3 at the annual Dragon City tournament, hosted by the Bendigo Volleyball Association. The team was made up of players from Billanook and Eltham High School, with ages falling between 13 and 15. For almost all the boys this was their first tournament playing against open age players and on a full height net.
A very long and hot Saturday kicked off with an 8am game and, after a slow start in their full first game together, narrowly lost to Walkers (from Mildura) 2-1, followed up with a close contest between the eventual champions, Melbourne Phantoms. Despite many efforts not showing up on the scoreboard the boys more than held their own against a much bigger and more experienced side. Next up were the minor premiers, Sioux Spikers, who managed to make their way through all pool games undefeated. Experience was the difference in the end, with Spikers able to score crucial points in broken play that proved to be enough for a victory.
At the half way point, despite only one set win on the board, the boys remained upbeat and focussed on the positives of what they had achieved in the mornings play. This attitude served them well going into the game against FOS (Albury-Wodonga), pulling off a 2-1 win on the back of some great serving and defence. The first set was a gutsy come from behind performance where the Falcon’s boys were able to score many points through sheer hustle and determination. The positive attitude and energy carried through to our fifth game of the day against a Renegades team made up mostly from older high school age students. Despite being smaller and younger than the Reds, the boys overcame their exhaustion and backed up some fantastic serving from Kalan Davenport for an emphatic victory, finishing the day on a high note.
To finish off their tournament, the boys played Riddell’s Creek on Sunday morning and came away with a 2-1 win to bring their record to 3-3. In the end, the team was only denied a top 3 finish by set percentage, a fantastic achievement for a very young team playing their first tournament together where every player managed to make an important contribution over the course of the weekend. A massive thankyou to EIV for assisting us with our arrangements for the weekend, and all the parents who came along to support, particularly the Morrows and the Rodgers for their assistance.
The team was: Luke Brisbane, Kalan Davenport, Tom Ross, Tom Dettmann, Darcy Rodgers, Matt Lester, Nathan Dorman, Aaron Morrow and Liam Sketcher (Captain/Coach).



