JEPARIT-RAINBOW president Jason Hutson has announced the club’s senior football coach for the 2018 Horsham District league season.
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Tim Inkster will take the reins from 2017 joint coaches Luke Murphy and Ash Clugston.
Inkster originally played for the Warrack Eagles in the Wimmera Football League and joined the North Ballarat Rebels program when he was 17.
He then played for the Ballarat Roosters in the Victorian Football League before moving to Darwin.
Inkster’s longest stint at a club was in the South Australian National Football League with Woodville-West Torrens Football Club.
There, Inkster played in a premiership in 2006.
He moved to the Henley Sharks Football Club in the Adelaide Football League and played in the Canberra Football League for the Ainslie Football Club.
Inkster moved back to his home region to take on his first playing-coach job in 2013 at the Warrack Eagles and continued in the 2014 season. He will be a non-playing coach for the Storm in 2018.
Inkster is now 38 years old.
Hutson said Inkster would bring a wealth of experience to the team.
“He will be able to coach from the sidelines, which is a positive,” he said.
“I think a lot of players will look up to him because of his career. He’s well known in the area.
“He has a lot of ideas.
“Our goal is to take that next step. We have played in a lot of preliminary finals but want to make the grand final.”
Inkster said he wanted the club to finish in the top two.
“We have a big gap to make up,” he said.
“The only thing we want to do is improve.
“We will need to replace (the players) who have left and add some players and I think we are sitting about the same at the moment.
“There’s a handful of players we would like to talk to.”
Inkster said he also wanted to build the community’s confidence in the club.
Inkster said he still had much to learn about his new team.
“It’s good in one respect because I am going in with no preconceived ideas of where blokes can play. That will be the first thing I work on,” Inkster said.
“I will then build from there. I have plans and ideas (about the philosophy and style of football) but in the end I will have to work with the players I have.”
The Storm have been active in the off season and Hutson said they have managed to retain Sam Cranna and Shane Maslin.
Murphy is unlikely to return after having an injury ridden season.
Queensland boys Elliot Bath, Brodie Grant and Daniel Carey are unlikely to return to the Storm.
