Dear members, life members, sponsors and supporters

What a fantastic season 2023 has been at the Drysdale Football Club. An enormous amount of work has resulted in some impressive results, but most importantly the club has represented our community, our families and our sponsors with pride.

Our senior playing group just kept getting better as the season went on. With great leadership from Binga and Ruggsy, our young group marched all the way to a Grand Final. Showing enormous heart after a gruelling final series, we were in it up to our eyeballs late in the game, only to fall just short. With a view to 2024 already, we are all ready to roll up our sleeves and go to work again. Ben Carmichael will be coaching by himself, but key pillars like Tom Ruggles, Ben Fennell and James Breust have committed also.

Our senior women had another sensational year. Good form during the year saw us finish second, but unfortunately injuries hurt come finals time, resulting in a third place finish. A massive thank you to Stuart Craven, the longest serving women's coach in the Geelong region, who is retiring his whiteboard! Stuart has done a magnificent job running our women’s program from the beginning and our club truly appreciates the enormous contribution Stuart has made. A big congratulations to Tara Smith who won the league Best and Fairest.

The DFC junior program is huge. Nearly 500 juniors are involved in our under age and Auskick programs. This would not happen without the input from our junior coordinator, Amy Milne, with a bit of help from Squizzy Taylor.

Finally I would just like to say a massive thanks to our very generous sponsors, who allow us to run this massive program, and then our volunteers for the enormous amount of work they do, which makes this club tick.

What a great year 2023 has been, and it looks like 2024 will be bigger and better still!

David Walder

President

Drysdale Football Club