Football may not be coming home but Hill Top's favourite son certainly is.
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Hill Top Northern Villages Cricket Club have revealed that former junior and Highland cricket royalty Dean Roxburgh will take up a coaching role in 2021-22 season.
Roxburgh, who has enjoyed a storied first grade career at Bowral and Robertson-Burrawang, will take to the field for his newly-formed Goulburn club in addition to taking charge of the Kookaburras off it.
Roxburgh said he would bring one thing to a Hill Top side looking to challenge for the premiership.
"Just experience really," he said.
"There's a chance for these guys who only know me on the park just to see the bloke off it. Just to see what it takes to go to the next level.
"With these young guys that are at Hill Top, they need to learn how to get to that level basically, make those big scores, take those amounts of wickets.
"Do that individually and then the team itself will do well. They've got the talent out at Hill Top, they've got a superstar side, they really do.
They've got the talent out at Hill Top, they've got a superstar side, they really do.
- Dean Roxburgh
"It's learning how to do things together but individually."
Roxburgh will have his hands full coaching in both Goulburn and the Highlands but said he was passionate about improving junior pathways in both regions.
"I came into first grade cricket at 13 so I want to give these guys a chance to come through, give them a pathway to higher levels of cricket faster," he explained.
"Then if they turn around after a few years and want to go to Canberra or Sydney they've been exposed to higher levels of cricket at a young age.
"So they're not going to go there like a deer in headlights."
Hill Top President Simon Reid said securing the veteran was a huge coup for the club.
"Dean's arguably been one of the better cricketers in the area over the past 15 years," Reid said.
"He obviously spent a long period of time playing junior cricket for Hill Top and I've been talking to Dean in the off-season about this opportunity to come home and start his coaching career where he started [playing].
"For Dean to be able to play a club coaching role across all three grades is a massive opportunity to take a lot of the learnings from him and get a different perspective into our club, but also to get a lot of feedback and build skills for current players."
"Getting new players who might want to be coached by someone of Dean's calibre is an awesome drawcard for the club."