Title Image: Drouin Mental Health Champions Kye Quirk & Lucy McKellar pictured with Gippsland League General Manager Daniel Heathcote launching the feature matchday between Drouin and Bairnsdale at neutral venue Morwell
Making better mental health our goal continues all year round. The Alinta Energy Gippsland League will be hosting our annual mental health awareness themed round on April 12th for round 2 of the 2025 season. This special theme round is proudly supported by our premier partner Loy Yang B and will continue to aim to help raise awareness of mental health issues and the impact it is having on our community and the quest of ‘making better mental health our goal’.
As an ongoing key issue in the community, the previous success of the round and the additional activations by clubs throughout each season continues to drive the message with our clubs and community.
“We are proud to continue to deliver this annual event with the support of Loy Yang B. We thank the member clubs of the Gippsland League for continuing to be key drivers of the message throughout many years and for their continuing support championing making better mental health a goal throughout the season” “While the League wide theme round delivers key messaging, the major impact comes through the member clubs becoming leaders in this space as they go above and beyond to deliver mental health programming throughout the year, making a difference in our communities”
said Gippsland League General Manager Daniel Heathcote.
The event enters its fifth season with the Gippsland League Mental Health Round featuring our 0 wearing football champions and blue bib wearing netball champions. Loy Yang B’s continued support of the Gippsland League and our community programs allows these type of events to champion change within each club and their community. The event will be run over the 5 match days with the Drouin v Bairnsdale set to be played at Morwell Recreation Reserve being the feature matchday of the round. Both football and netball will be engaged with activities on the day. The main activation in the round will see one mental health champion from each football team across the four grades wear a specially designed jumper featuring a blue 0 on the back to represent the push for zero lives lost to mental health. These jumpers represent the League and member clubs’ united position to support better mental health across our clubs and communities. In each netball match a mental health champion from each team will wear a special blue bib. Each netball match will also feature the use of a special blue netball match ball. All football and netball players and officials will be wearing blue arm bands to support the quest to make better mental health our goal. All 10 matches at each venue will have a medal to be awarded to the Alliance Player of the Game. This medal will be decided by the winning sides coaching panel and is awarded to the player they believe demonstrated the most courage, determination and teamwork for the winning side.
