Bridgetown footballer Darcy Craven makes debut at Royals

An up-and-coming Bridgetown footballer made his West Australian Football League debut at the weekend. Darcy Craven, 16, made his WAFL colts debut for East Perth on Saturday, ending in a 12.9 (81) to 9.8 (62) win against West Perth. Craven made a name for himself in the Lower South West Football League this year playing in the midfield for Bridgetown colts, sitting third on the goal-scoring ladder after booting 16 goals in only eight matches. Called up to the Bulldogs’ league team on a number of occasions this year as a small forward, the young player has managed to boot 10 goals, including a five-goal haul against the Tigers. Craven made headlines last month after being named a joint-winner of the 2021 Connor Blakely Award for Excellence after an impressive performance across a handful of games in the WAFL Simply Energy Futures competition earlier in the year. Craven joins a host of other local footballers who have made their way to the WAFL over the years, such as fellow Royals Harley Sparks, Taylor North and Joshua Ladhams, as well as Blair Della Franca and Zachary Dent at South Fremantle, Clayton Giblett at Perth and Kalin Lane, who was drafted to the AFL by the Brisbane Lions last month from Claremont.