Jones marks Milestone with 500 game achievement

There wouldn’t be many Saturday afternoons in football season that you wouldn’t see the presence of Chris Jones on a ground somewhere in the Barwon Region. Chris recently clocked up the remarkable effort of officiating 500 matches of football locally over roughly a 10-year period.

He decided to grab the whistle after a playing career at local clubs Inverleigh, Grovedale, and Geelong Amateur, where he retired from the game in the middle of the 2006. Unfortunately, 3 head knocks over a short period led Chris to hang up the playing boots. This eventually become a blessing for the local umpiring fraternity.

Umpiring certainly wasn’t front of mind or something that Chris had planned to do after footy, although he was missing the game, and was wanting to get active, so he took up the whistle. 

Over his distinguished umpiring career, he modestly described his ability to continue to perform at the highest level through staying fit and undertaking recovery accordingly. “People who know me, know I love running which might be a weird thing to say”. Thios running base, staying healthy and recovery sessions following up to 4 games accross a weekend. “I do a lot of recovery in the sea water at Eastern Beach accross a Sunday. I am pretty sore on a Sunday night” Jones explained.

Despite umpiring his own matches accross the weekend, he also shares his learnings to the young umpires. “The biggest thrill I get at the moment is seeing the up-and-coming junior umpires progress through. I have been lucky enough to have been umpiring for a lot of their senior debuts, which is really awesome. It’s something I take great pride in with coaching the junior development field umpires as well. Seeing them progress to Senior ranks is really rewarding.” Jones stated.

Chris described umpiring as the “best seat in the house” especially being able to watch Mathieson Medallists, Matt McMahon and Harry Benson up close. These were two players who he described as some of the best he has umpired over recent times. 

AFL Barwon Director of Football Umpiring, Jock Hillgrove described Chris as an ‘absolute gem’ in the umpire fraternity.

“He is always available to do multiple games if needed, and clearly having reached 500 games so quickly, it is a testament to Chris’s commitment. He has also been our Field Development Coach over the last 5 years and is very supportive of all those that have taken up field umpiring. He is a great mentor for everyone around him”.

Hillgrove regards Jones as a ‘very genuine well-liked person’ and emphasised how highly respected he is across our AFL Barwon Region.

“I’m so pleased for Chris on his milestone knowing that he has so much more to contribute to his journey as an umpire and umpire coach, I have great respect for his passion and commitment to umpiring “, said Hillgrove.

Jones doesn’t plan to hang up the whistle anytime soon with him, “I have still got the passion in me to continue going”.

The AFL Barwon community congratulates Chris on wonderful achievement and look forward to seeing him continue to set the standards for those emerging umpires. 

This week is a celebration of Community Umpiring across the AFL, if you are looking to get involved umpiring, simply go to https://play.afl/umpire