The Greater Western Victoria Rebels girls’ team will take the field at Latrobe University in Bundoora today for its first game of the 2022 Under-19 NAB League Girls season with Hamilton talents, Jess Rentsch and Jedah Huf, both selected in the side to take on Gippsland Power.

Both girls have impressed within the four walls of the club, voted into the leadership group by their teammates and coaches, as well as earning high praise from head coach, David Loader.

“They are brand new to the (Rebels) program and we’ve been super impressed with both of those girls,” he told The Spectator.

“They’ve stepped in and really want to do anything they possibly can to make the team better, they’re pretty impressive.

“From what we’ve seen of them so far, I’d be pretty confident that they will both have an impact (today).”

Rentsch said being selected to be in the leadership group was an honour and something she definitely hadn’t expected.

“Over the break, the girls had to text Deeks (David Loader) who we wanted our top five (to be),” she said.

“I was very surprised; it didn’t even cross my mind that I could even get into the side … it feels unreal, really unexpected … (but) I am always excited to learn new things when it comes to footy.”

Bringing the intensity at the NAB League level was a particular focus for the prolific ball winner in the Western Victoria Female Football League (WVFFL).

“(My focus) is just to play to the best of my ability, to lay a couple of tackles and give it a good red-hot crack, (also to) try and structure and read the play a bit better,” Rentsch said.

While Huf hasn’t had much experience in the football landscape, she has played at a high level in netball and basketball and felt that could help her in the new role.

“I feel I have some experience helping to bring people together who might not know each other well, if at all … I am so excited,” she said.

“(I’m) pretty excited to be selected in the round one team, but hope there’s plenty more to come, I have been doing a bit of practice but it’s going to take a fair bit more I’m afraid,” she laughed.

Huf said match preparation had been good, with her spending plenty of time on her marking and kicking skills.

“I find training quite fun, especially learning so many new skills and meeting new people,” she said.

“It's awesome to have Jess alongside me to guide the way a bit so we can discuss ideas.”

Loader was pleased to have footy back and couldn’t wait to see how the team would come together and perform for the first round of the new 10-game season.

“It should be great to have footy back and to have a relatively new squad, we have 14 debutants this week in our NAB game and 22 new faces in our Futures game, we are really excited for it,” he said.

“(Training) has been pretty good, obviously very interrupted with COVID, we can’t control a lot of that stuff, I think we have 15 girls unavailable this week.

“But this provides the opportunity for players coming in to show what they’re capable of.”

The unavailable players included some of the more experienced players in the side who had played in years prior, such as Hamilton’s Paige Kissel.

The Rebels won’t be the only side with a new look team this season with Loader highlighting the improvement within Power’s team.

“(Gippsland Power’s team) has changed dramatically, their numbers are up over 100 per cent compared to last year … we’re expecting them to improve dramatically from last year, it should be a good contest,” he said.

Connection will likely be a big focus for the girls as they begin to learn and figure out how each other plays on game day.

“We’re really looking at what they can bring as a group, it’s super hard to expect to achieve much more than that based on the fact that these girls have only had five full training sessions together.”

The Futures Squad will kick of their game at 11am with the Under-19 game to follow at 1pm.