Winners: Harrison McPhee (left) accepts a cheque for $5000 from Dylan Buckley on behalf of the Rochester Football Netball Club. Photo: Dyl and Friends
Rochester Football Netball Club has been given $5000 as the recipients of the Dyl and Friends community giveaway.
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The giveaway was organised by Dyl and Friends, a podcast hosted by former Carlton and GWS player Dylan Buckley, with the money being donated to a worthy community club.
Rochester member Harrison McPhee entered the competition on behalf of the club after seeing the promotion on Instagram.
“I saw on Instagram that Dyl and Friends posted a giveaway they were going to do with CoinSpot,” he said.
“So CoinSpot were going to give $5000 away to a football club and you basically had to write in and say why your football club deserves it, and what you're going to do with the cash.
“So, yeah, actually I saw a couple of boys actually nominate (Rochester) and I wasn't going to, but I just thought I might as well have a crack, and they gave me a ring to say I've won, so yeah, happy days.”
McPhee received a call from the team behind the podcast informing him of the win, which he described as “unreal” for the club and wider community.
“I never win anything, so it was actually really nice to win something for once,” he said.
“And it’s not for me, it’s actually for the footy club, and it will go towards the community and the club for what they’ve been through and everything, so it was just unreal to get that call.”
In a clip posted to Instagram, Buckley revealed that Rochester’s plight following the floods had touched him, admitting McPhee’s entry “brought a tear to our eyes”.
“We had so many entries and so many deserving people,” Buckley told the Rochester playing group.
“But for you guys, we heard about the fences, we heard about the netball club, we heard about the whole football club and even individuals affected with your homes.
“Hopefully this $5000 cheque helps play a small role in getting your footy club back to where it needs to be, we know there’s a long way to go and we are obviously going to do as much as we can.”
Getting stuck in: Dylan Buckley (middle) during a Tuesday night training session with Rochester. Photo: Dyl and Friends
Presenting the cheque in person, Buckley participated in a Tuesday training session with the group a few weeks ago, which McPhee said was a highlight for everyone involved.
“That was unreal,” he said.
“He came down I think it was a couple of Tuesdays ago and he was amazing, just spoke really well and did a couple skits and chatted with all the boys and you know, everyone loved it.
“He was just so enthusiastic and got around all the players and chatted to them and whatnot, it was pretty good.”
Club president Justin Cleary was thankful for the support from Buckley, with the money to be used wherever possible to help the struggling community.
“Dylan came up recently and presented us with the cheque,” he said.
“That was really nice, and we're using that money to help provide community engagement programs that we're running this year at Rochester.
“We’re running lots of other co-events along with our football to engage with our dislocated community such as some live entertainment, we’ve got various kids’ activities. We’ve been having free meals after games as well because we’ve had some funding coming in for that.
“We're also supporting our players with free memberships this year, free memberships for our entire community, because there’s so many people in need, and we’re just spreading that money where we can to help the community and our members.”
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