#CanWolfPack Travelling Manager Announcement

Could I be any more stoked to have been named the new Travelling Manager for the Field Hockey Canada Women's National Team, otherwise known as the #CanWolfPack? Nope!

Transcript

Keely Dunn: [00:00:00] This is great. Okay. So for those of you who don't know where the heck I've been for the last week, sort of, and why it was that I couldn't stream last Wednesday it's because things have kind of things have happened. If you haven't tuned in to the stories or anything like that. It's still a little bit on the DL, which I don't really understand, but it's okay. It's no longer on the DL. I'm blowing this up. I'm blowing it up. It's on blast. I've been appointed as the new travelling manager of the Canadian women's national team. Wait. Yeah. So that's a thing that happened. 

Now, what I want to tell you about. I want to reassure you that this is not going to in any way take away from the things that I do as FHumpires. In fact, I'm really excited about all the things that I'm going to learn, and I'm going to be able to bring into what we do in our learning, escapades, understanding players and coaches, what they're looking for, what drives them, how they react to our decisions, what they understand the rules to be is going to of course, turn into, a greater ability for us to understand how to serve them better on the pitch. So I think this is going to be really, really amazing.

 I'm also real excited because there is the opportunity, I think, for the entire hockey world to see our contributions as third teamers in a different way. That we're not adversaries, we're not working against, we're not police people, none of that stuff.

We are actually there to facilitate and encourage and help construct the most amazing game of hockey we possibly can. And my goal is to show exactly how that can happen. So I'm, I'm over the moon excited. I'm also a little bit tired because last week was a long week. I was at the selection camp for the Canadian women's team.

And just basically getting to know them. A lot of the players are new to me there, because they're younger and I haven't had the chance to, to umpire them very much domestically. So it's going to be interesting. It's going to be a very interesting relationship. It's kind of like, I think my head coach who is Andrew Wilson, if you didn't know he's from England, but most recently from the Spanish setup, he was the assistant coach there and he it's like, he's put the cat amongst the pigeons, or the pigeon amongst the cats. And what he wants to achieve is in part reflected in how uncomfortable we all are with this whole thing. So it's going to be really great.

Whit Ryan: [00:02:45] Before we get into that. I just want to congratulate you on your appointment. 

Keely Dunn: [00:02:48] Oh, thank you. 

Whit Ryan: [00:02:50] I think, I mean, I know how hard you've worked for this. I know how excited you've been. I also know how hard it is then for you to keep it under wraps 

Keely Dunn: [00:02:59] …because I've done a very bad job of it?

Whit Ryan: [00:03:01] Well, I mean, I didn't say that, but you know, I genuinely think not only is this fantastic for you. I think having somebody, so well-versed in third team engaging with players on a day-to-day basis can do nothing but good for the sport. Yeah, for the umps. And not just for the players, but also for the umpires. Hopefully. I mean, as you said, it doesn't have to be an adversarial relationship. There are going to be moments when you're not going to be happy with each other. And that's great. But to understand that we're all on the same. Side.

Keely Dunn: [00:03:35] Yeah. 

Whit Ryan: [00:03:35] The side of good hockey. 

Keely Dunn: [00:03:36] Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much. And I, I, I know it has been done before. I think I mentioned it weeks and weeks ago on a show that Nathan Stagno, who I've talked about several times on the broadcast. Cause he's fascinating and he's worthy of discussion, but he is from Gibraltar, Olympic level umpire, retired now and he showed up. I remember seeing him in the, in the TMS, in the FIH database showing up as a manager for the Gibraltar senior men's team at a European competition. So whether it was like a div three or div two or something like that, I wasn't really sure. I don't remember now, but I remember seeing that years ago and thinking, “huh?” Stagno? What? And it didn't even clue into me at that point, that that could be a really beneficial thing. So if anybody out there has heard of anybody else you know, retired FIH umpires, doing this kind of role for a national squad, I'd be super interested because I want to call them up and find out what I should do. I need help. So I'm looking for advice, but there you go, thanks Whit, I really appreciate it.