FROM camping and motorbike riding on her spare days, to working as an apprentice industrial electrician during the week, Gippsland Power\u2019s Emily Haeusler has always enjoyed using her hands.<\/p>\n
It comes without surprise that the Power defender has improved rapidly in season 2018, with intercept marking and rarely losing a one-on-one contest as the cornerstones of her game. Originally a midfielder, Haeusler was thrown into a role at half-back after round one and has been one of the most consistent defenders across the season, earning her a place in the\u00a0AFL Draft Central<\/em>\u00a0TAC Cup Team of the Year<\/strong>.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve mainly played through the midfield and this is only my third year, but I got put in the half-back and that was something quite new to me,\u201d Haeusler said. \u201cI had to ask where to stand when the ball goes up. \u201cIt\u2019s been a really good year and I\u2019ve developed so much, kicking on both feet and playing a new position it\u2019s just great.\u201d<\/p>\n Haeusler said she loved attacking the ball and had learnt when to approach a contest, and when to hang back. Her disposal by foot is the next step for her as a footballer to improve.<\/p>\n \u201cI think that (my improvements) would mainly be my kicking,\u201d she said. \u201cI still kick them ones that are not high and they\u2019re not direct, but there\u2019s always room for improvement in that kind of thing.\u201d<\/p>\n Her football journey almost could have been different had she not taken the opportunity to have a kick at her local school.<\/p>\n \u201cSo my brothers, they always played football and that was sort of everything I wanted to do, but it was always the boys\u2019 sport and my dad said \u2018Nah you can\u2019t play because you\u2019ll get hurt\u2019,\u201d Haeusler said. \u201cSo I started playing footy in Year 7 with the girls team and just loved it ever since. I came to Gippsland Power and just it\u2019s just been my thing, I think I\u2019ve found my groove.\u201d<\/p>\n The friendships brought about by the sport, and particularly at the Gippsland Power, have been some of the best memories for Haeusler over the past couple of years, and many long road trips have been spent chatting on the way to games.<\/p>\n :For training I\u2019ve only got to go 20 minutes, it\u2019s really, really convenient and I\u2019m very lucky in that way,\u201d Haeusler said. \u201c(For) games they\u2019re mainly Melbourne-based because we\u2019re a country team, but it still doesn\u2019t affect me because I carpool with a lot of friends. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t change my love for the game and wanting to be there.\u201d<\/p>\n Haeusler is the first to admit she is probably in a different situation to many other top-age TAC Cup Girls footballers.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s not many girls that are out of school,\u201d she said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got those few that are 19 year-olds and in uni. \u201cBut I\u2019m a first year apprentice which is very different and it\u2019s hard because I can get quite tired and sometimes I will work and still go to the footy. \u201cThe girls and the club have been very understanding of that though, so it\u2019s good.\u201d<\/p>\n The 17 year-old apprentice industrial electrician is following a passion of hers, that combines a number of aspects she loves.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve always wanted to do things with my hands but I still love physics and the maths based side of everything like that, so electrician was sort of the way to go,\u201d she said. \u201cIt still engaged my brain a lot of the time, but it was a practical job.\u201d<\/p>\n Outside of work and football, Haeusler loves family trips, and will pitch a tent or jump on a motorbike whenever she gets the chance.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re a very outdoorsy family so I\u2019ve just done whatever the brother did and followed in his footsteps, so lots of going up the bush with the family and any of that sort of stuff,\u201d she said. \u201cThat is (the perfect weekend), and sometimes I incorporate them both (footy and outdoors activities). \u201cObviously footy\u2019s my priority for the weekend, but if I get the Sunday off, I will go up the bush. \u201cThat\u2019s our thing.\u201d<\/p>\n Haeusler hopes her passion for the sport she loves rubs off on the way she plays, with the goal of improving even more as the year goes on.<\/p>\n \u201c(I\u2019m looking forward to) people knowing who I am and (thinking) she\u2019s still only young and she\u2019s come from sort of nowhere and she really has that passion and that drive to get better,\u201d she said.\u00a0 \u201cHopefully (I can) play some VFL. \u201cI did get a letter for Vic Country so I\u2019m trying my very best to see how far I can go with that and see where it takes me.\u201d<\/p>\n The amount of opportunities now available in the youth girls space has not been lost on Haeusler and has a message for anyone considering taking up the sport.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s up and coming and exciting, there\u2019s so many opportunities,\u201d she said. \u201cIf they\u2019re there, why not have a go and say yes to all them things? \u201cThere\u2019s always room for improvement and development.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" FROM camping and motorbike riding on her spare days, to working as an apprentice industrial electrician during the week, Gippsland Power\u2019s Emily Haeusler has always enjoyed using her hands. It comes without surprise that the Power defender has improved rapidly in season 2018, with intercept marking and rarely losing a one-on-one contest as the cornerstones […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":64,"featured_media":33098,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[278,11591,18218,7950,8,137],"tags":[2763,3492,11664,2964,40,9539,138,5429],"class_list":["post-35816","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-feature-articles","category-gippsland-power","category-gippsland-power-girls","category-nab-league-girls","category-news","category-womens","tag-afl-womens","tag-emily-haeusler","tag-emily-haeusler-feature","tag-feature","tag-gippsland-power","tag-nab-league-girls-features","tag-tac-cup-girls","tag-tac-cup-team-of-the-year"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/64"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35816"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35816\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87911,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35816\/revisions\/87911"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}