2024 NFC Senior Men’s Coaching Panel

The Norwood Football Club would like to welcome Shane Hickey, Ben Patrick, Jesse Lonergan and Aaron Jelfs to the Senior Men’s Coaching panel for the 2024 season.

Jelfs will be the Reserves Coach in 2024, while Hickey, Patrick and Lonergan make up Senior Coach Jade Rawlings’ assistant coaching panel. 2023 assistant coaches James Saywell and Adam Smith will be returning in 2024.

Shane Hickey joins the Norwood coaching group after a successful coaching stint at local football. Shane originates from Victoria where he began his coaching career as a development coach at the Modewarre Football Club in the Bellarine Football League in Victoria.

He moved to Adelaide for work in 2016 where he took up the position of senior assistant at the Adelaide Lutheran Football Club. Shane spent four years at Luthies, which included an A grade premiership in 2017, before taking on the head coaching role at Pooraka Football Club in 2020.

Shane spent four years at the Bulls, where he oversaw a rebuild of the playing list, which resulted in the formation of three competitive senior grades, a premiership in 2021, and finals appearances every year.

Shane is an accredited Level 3 coach who is excited to join the Redlegs and contribute to their 2024 campaign.

Ben Patrick originates from Victoria where he played over 250 games in the Geelong Football League. He represented the Geelong Football League at the Vic Championships where they were crowned Vic Champions and was selected in the Victorian Country Squad.

Ben’s coaching experience spans over 10 years in AFL/VFL programs and varying roles with Werribee, North Melbourne, Essendon, Port Melbourne, the VFL State Team and AFL Vic Young Guns.

Ben holds an AFL Level 3 High Performance qualification. He is in the process of relocating to Adelaide with wife Kelly and will join the program in January.

Jesse Lonergan is well known to the majority of the group from his AFL and SANFL football journey, Jesse was selected as the 13th pick by the Gold Coast Suns in the 2012 AFL draft, played a total of 60 games before his delisting in 2018.

He continued his football journey with Woodville-West Torrens from 2019, contributing as a leadership group member from 2020 until 2023 and helping the team to win consecutive premierships in 2020 and 2021.

Jesse has recently retired from playing in 2023 after five years with the Eagles and now is looking forward to moving into coaching at Norwood and imparting his experience and knowledge of the game with our group.

Beyond his football career, Jesse works in the disability employment sector, demonstrating a strong commitment to aiding those in challenging circumstances.

Additionally, he serves as an assistant coach for South Australian state Inclusive AFL team which competes with players who have an intellectual disability and recently participated in the National Inclusive Carnival in Queensland who came runner up to Tasmania in 2023.

Aaron Jelfs (Reserves Head Coach) is excited and looking forward to working within the senior program at the Norwood Football Club, assisting in the development of players and strive for club success.

He’s a young, enthusiastic, and passionate coach who has a strong eagerness to learn, develop and grow with the players, coaches and support staff.

In Aaron’s early playing career, he was a part of the development programs at the Norwood Football Club, before moving across and spending the latter part of his career with the Tea Tree Gully Football Club. Over a 10-year career, he played across both A and B grade, captaining the B-grade for five years, and was awarded with Division 1 reserves league medal.

More recently, for the past two seasons, Aaron has coached in the Border Districts Football Club in the KNTFL league. In 2023, the club made its first finals appearance in 24-years and won their first premiership since 1991.

He was fortunate to be recognised for the club’s success and awarded Coach of The Year in the KNTFL Team of The Year. In conjunction with this, he undertook a role with Norwood Under 18’s program as midfield coach, and for the past two years, was head coach for the Norwood Under 15’s development program.

Aaron has completed his level 3 coaching accreditation.