AN eye-opening, two-week tour of South Africa confirmed two things to Thurgoona youngster Lonnie Hampton.
Firstly, the supremely talented junior footballer realised Australia was, indeed, the lucky country, but the trip also confirmed to him that a career in football was something he wanted to chase.
Hampton, 16, toured South Africa with the AFL’s indigenous youth team, nicknamed the Flying Boomerangs, with the squad playing two games against local opposition at Johannesburg and Cape Town.
The year 10 James Fallon High School student, as is his want, starred in both, but playing football was only part of the story.
Aside from locking horns with some of the developing country’s best players, the Flying Boomerangs — guided by recently retired AFL players Michael O’Loughlin, Chris Johnson and Malcolm Lynch — conducted football clinics and visited Johannesburg’s Apartheid Museum, the Hector Pieterson Memorial, Pilanesberg National Park, Cape Town’s Table Mountain and Robben Island.
It was an amazing opportunity for any teenager, let-alone someone on their first international trip. Hampton, who had never been overseas before, loved the experience.
“It was really good, we got to tour Johannesburg and Cape Town and ... we walked through a few small townships,” the softly spoken youngster said.
“It was amazing to see how people lived over there, just in tin shacks — it was very different to home.
“Now I know that we should appreciate what we’ve got here (in Australia).”
Hampton was chosen in the squad after shining at an AFL KickStart Camp in Melbourne in August last year.
The camp was the highlight of a packed 2009 for Hampton — he got a chance to watch St Kilda training, met Olympic champion Cathy Freeman, performed some AIS-AFL high performance testing and also played on the MCG as a curtain-raiser before a Richmond-Hawthorn match.
Apart from that amazing opportunity, he also regularly starred for Lavington at junior level last year — he played a major role in the Panthers winning the Albury-Wodonga Junior Football League under-16 premiership — and also represented the Murray Bushrangers, Riverina, NSW-ACT Rebels and Ovens and Murray under-15 teams.
Not a bad effort for someone who started playing football only a few years ago after switching from rugby league.
He still played league last year — showing enough talent to be picked in the Riverina under-15 side — but after the trip to South Africa, his eyes are now firmly fixed on a possible AFL career.
“I probably won’t play league any more ... hopefully I can play AFL one day,” he said.
“I want to go as far as I can in football.”
Indeed, Hampton’s selection in the indigenous youth team could well be a sign of things to come, considering present AFL players Austin Wonaeamirri (Melbourne), Brad Dick (Collingwood) and Nathan Krakouer (Port Adelaide) also came through the AFL’s KickStart program.
With a skill-set as audacious as many of the indigenous players who have graced AFL fields, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Hampton one day reaching the top level.
Hampton is the latest nominee for the 2010 Norske Skog Young Achiever Award. He will be among 12 nominees who will be honoured during an awards dinner in Albury next month.
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