FALCONS' NEW LEADERS MORE THAN READY

WEST Perth premiership coach Bill Monaghan has no doubt that new co-captains Jay van Berlo and Luke Tedesco will step seamlessly into the shoes left by Jason Salecic both because they are outstanding leaders, and experienced in the role with Salecic limited to 12 of 22 games in 2013.

Salecic was an inspirational leader at West Perth being captain since he took over from Clayton Lasscock ahead of the 2008 season, but when he was limited to just four games in the first 17 rounds of 2013, it allowed the captains of the future the chance to rehearse for the future role.

Salecic made it back to play the last eight games of the 2013 season including the grand final victory over East Perth that saw him end his decorated WAFL career with the Falcons as a dual premiership player, as a premiership skipper to go with 213 matches, seven appearances for WA and a Breckler Medal.

That is quite the legacy to leave, but West Perth will now head into its premiership defence in 2014 with Tedesco and van Berlo as its co-captains, and with both ready for the captaincy role.

Tedesco made his league debut with West Perth in 2007 and has now gone on to play 105 games for the club including last year's premiership where he worked tremendously hard to make it back from a calf injury in time to play in.

The 27-year-old has cemented himself as an outstanding member of the defensive unit both as a tough-as-nails mid-sized defender, but also a strong leader and someone who can set up play out of the back-line with his terrific kicking skills.

Despite still being only 25 years of age, van Berlo has already played in the AFL where he managed 32 matches for the Fremantle Dockers between 2009 and 2012.

On top of that, van Berlo represented Western Australia in a drought breaking State match victory over Victoria in Northam in 2013 and is putting together a high-quality WAFL career with West Perth.

Van Berlo made his WAFL league debut with West Perth in 2007 and went on to win the club's fairest and best award in 2008 before attracting the attention of Fremantle where he was added onto the rookie-list in 2009.

He continued to play at West Perth over the next four years while not playing in the AFL with the Dockers, and returned full-time to the Falcons in 2013.

He quickly cemented himself as a prime midfielder in the competition once again and was a key contributor to the Falcons claiming the 2013 premiership with a grand final victory over arch-rivals East Perth at Patersons Stadium.

The pair will be joined in the Falcons' leadership group this year by premiership players Matt Guadagnin and Marc Crisp, and Cameron Branch who captained the West Perth reserves into the grand final in 2013.

Monaghan is comfortable and confident that the two new captains van Berlo and Tedesco, and the entire leadership will show the way for the Falcons in 2014.

"It's as seamless as you can get. Jason has been an outstanding leader at our football club for a number of years, but Luke, Jay and Ray Bartholomew last year as our vice-captains had to step up because Jason missed nearly half the season," Monaghan said.

"The fact that Jason missed that amount of time made the transition to new captains really easy to manage because they had already captained for a lot of time last year. It's not a big change at all and we knew that Jason's time as captain was coming to an end whether he did play on this year or not.

"So we did give those guys more responsibilities during the season last year so it's now a really smooth transition into the captaincy for Jay and Luke.

"They are both outstanding leaders, but with their character and way they go about the game is slightly different. It should be a good mix. We are also always looking for who will be leading the club in the future so we look at that when deciding our leadership group."

BY CHRIS PIKE