Eight Fremantle Dockers destined to be at the forefront of their football club for the next decade are in Melbourne with Australian basketball legend Luc Longley in a development opportunity aimed at enhancing their leadership skills and abilities.

Alex Silvagni, Hayden Ballantyne, Michael Barlow, Greg Broughton, Nat Fyfe, Stephen Hill, Nick Suban and Anthony Morabito were the players chosen to attend the inaugural RCR Tomlinson Jeff Hogan Emerging Leaders Experience from 17-19 November.

Fremantle Senior development coach/assistant coach Simon Lloyd said it was a fantastic opportunity for a group of players who are seen as an integral part of the club’s future.

“We’ve got this young group that is coming through and we need to accelerate their development,” he said.

“And not just their technical and tactical side... you’ve also got to focus on their leadership and mental skills.

“It really helps to get away as a group and focus on those things.

“It’s about empowering this group which is very important with where we want to go as a club.”

Longley is an Olympian and a three-time NBA champion with the Chicago Bulls in the 90s, where he was a teammate of one of the greatest athletes in sporting history, Michael Jordan.

“That’s really exciting for all of the boys, meeting someone who’s had the leadership experiences that Luc’s had,” Lloyd said.

“He’ll be doing a lot of one-on-one mentoring and some group work as well.”

Lloyd said the club wanted the players to be proactive in the process during the experience.

“We’ll challenge them,” he said.

“They are not just going away to sit back and take things in, we want them to get involved and be open and honest and direct with each other.

“They’re a very driven group and we need them to step up and compliment the likes of Matthew Pavlich, Aaron Sandilands and David Mundy as leaders of their footy club.”

Lloyd said the true test to measure what the players took out of this experience would come further down the track.

“We’ll find out a lot about this group, not in the next three days, but when things get really tough during the season and in future seasons, when they’re under some adversity,” he said.

“That is what this trip is all about, discussing these things and some of the lessons they’ll learn will hopefully come to the fore when they’re under pressure.”

The concept was first discussed after RCR Tomlinson chairman Roderick Brown approached the club in early 2011 with interest in establishing a scholarship in the memory of the late Jeff Hogan, who passed away in December 2010.

Hogan, a former director of RCR Tomlinson, was an ardent and passionate supporter of the Fremantle Dockers.

He developed relationships with young Fremantle Dockers players and was often regarded as a mentor to many of the players.

RCR Tomlinson wanted to create a scholarship to continue the support that Hogan offered young footballers in the same manner.

Lloyd said the players would not be able to have this experience without RCR and Jeff Hogan.

“We really do appreciate the ability to go away and I know the players are well aware of and truly thankful for the opportunity they’ve been given,” he said.

“It’s about developing young leaders, which is what Jeff Hogan was all about.”

RCR Tomlinson is a leading multi-disciplined engineering company in the provision of integrated solutions to the Mining, Energy, Resources and Power sectors.