Canterbury based Izaak Williams has been appointed head coach of the Central Giants for the 2018 AFL New Zealand Premiership Season.
Izaak Williams is a relatively new face when it comes to the AFL New Zealand Premiership but his involvement with the sport within New Zealand spans over almost 10 years.
Williams has represented New Zealand at Under 20 level and also Canterbury at Provincial level but injuries have prevented him from being able to showcase his full potential in the playing arena. His focus turned to coaching and in 2017 worked under New Zealand National and Central Giants head coach Rob Malone where he developed his craft.
“I’m very excited about the opportunity to take on the head coach role at the Central Giants in 2018. Having been involved during the 2017 competition, I developed a good relationship with the players and now know the level that we have to be at to become a Premiership winning team.”
The 27 year old has also taken on the position as head coach for the Canterbury Cobra’s 2017 NPC side and will look to ready his players for not only the Provincial Champs in December but also for the Premiership which commences early February.
“Currently, we have 10 AFL New Zealand Premiership players from last year in the Canterbury squad and will hopefully grow this list for next years competition.”
With the inclusion of the RPL Category 2 in the Retained Players List criteria for the upcoming 2018 season, each Premiership side will be able to retain up to three players that are Auckland based who have represented New Zealand at senior level in the past 12 months.
The RPL Category 2 rule states that if a Premiership side cannot supply the required amount of representatives from the 2017 season, a Priority Draft Pick will be allocated at the National Draft to rectify this.
The Central Giants are set to benefit from this new rule having only one representative in 2017 Captain David Rattenbury who represented New Zealand during International Cup in August and the ANZAC Campaign earlier in April 2017.
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