After a long serving commitment to football, we farewell Eddy De Gabriele as the FSC Chair after 15 years in the role, having been appointed by the Illawarra Unification Committee and the FNSW Board to the role. In addition to this, Eddy also served as President of the Illawarra Football Association for a period of 5 years.
Eddy has worked tirelessly to lead with collaboration, professionalism and passion and we thank him for his service to football in the region. Eddy was also recently awarded the FNSW State Award in recognition of his significant contribution.
Here are some key achievements of FSC in the last 15 years:
- Football Unification commences (2004)
- FFA approves use of FFA logo (2011)
- Wollongong selected as base for the A-League All Stars (2014)
- Commencement of grand finals at WIN Stadium (2016)
- Creation of South Coast Flame FC (2017)
- Installation of the regions first synthetic pitch (2018)
- Successful Management of COVID and wet weather (2020)
- Creation of South Coast Flame FC and the addition of girls / women’s pathway (2021)
- Implementation of the Women’s Illawarra Premier League (2023)
We also take this opportunity to announce Martin Rowney as the new FSC Chair and Tracey Freeman as Deputy Chair.
Martin, a partner at RMB Lawyers, has been involved in football across three decades as a Tarrawanna junior player, Woonona Junior Football Club secretary and team coach, member of the FSC Junior Council and more recently FSC Independent Director and then Deputy Chair.
Tracey has been on the FSC board since 2022 and has worked closely with clubs on their infrastructure projects and the Women’s Council. Tracey has extensive experience as a Human Resources Leader and is on a number of community committees and boards.
We would like to take this opportunity to welcome Martin and Tracey to their new roles and thank Eddy for his dedication to football over the last 20 years in his various leadership roles.
