By Jarrod Potter
IT’S HARD to believe Vic Metro vice-captain, centre-half-back and dual 2016 premiership player Jordyn Allen is only 15 years old.
Dandenong Stingrays’ defender Allen, the football phenomenon from Rye, is off to an incredible start to 2016 on-field as she’s already been the centrepiece of two premiership winning defences.
Starting with Dandenong’s Youth Girls Academy recently, she upped the ante again this week for Vic Metro’s national championship winning team and Allen’s rapid rise through the ranks was duly rewarded on Friday night.
Not only did she get to celebrate the AFL Youth Girls National Championships triumph – as her Vic Metro team smashed Western Australia by 95 points at the MCG – but she was also named Vic Metro’s MVP for her dour, defensive efforts and leadership from the back half.
“It’s so hard to process – so much has happened in the last hour and it’s all down to the effort we put in for the last seven-or-eight months and all the girls that pushed us to get here,” Allen said. “Best year definitely and even thinking back to this time last year and back to now, it’s been the most successful year.
“My football has gone an absolute mile and it’s awesome to be part of such an elite program – with the Stingrays and Vic Metro – it’s the best program on the earth.”
The Rock of Rye didn’t take her foot off the pedal in the state colours; determined and dogged, but cool under pressure at the same time, Allen endured the best the rest of the country had to offer and more often than not, dished it back at them ten-fold.
Tough, high-flying forwards from Western Australia, Queensland and Vic Country stood shoulder-to-shoulder with her throughout the carnival, but Allen brushed them aside as she racked up the defensive clearances, spoils and a truckload of smothers.
She wouldn’t take any individual credit for Vic Metro’s defence though; Allen said it was through the back six and backline coach Alex Saundry, the roaming midfielders and even pressure up the ground from the forwards that made her job easier.
“I guess it’s just that we’re working as a team,” Allen said. “We’ve been bang on with our structures and it’s pretty self-explanatory.
“Keeping WA scoreless and our work-rate and Saundry, the effort she’s put into us and how much trust and belief she’s put into us plus the effort we’ve put ourselves through to get to this point.”
Vic Metro coach Wayne Siekman said there isn’t any surprise that she’s the side’s MVP; there’s a lot going for her game already and Allen will only improve from here on.
“Her football knowledge, leadership and understanding of the game is probably better than nearly everyone,” Siekman said. “We had no hesitation in making her a vice captain as age isn’t a huge issue for us.
“She led our back-line and probably the main reason she won our MVP was because our game-plan revolves around her and she played a ‘Brady’ – a quarterback role – and wherever she directed the play to go, that’s where we followed.”
