One major change is that teams will play more games during the week.  From Monday-Wednesday teams will play a minimum of 5 games in the preliminary round before the knockout games and finals take place.

But just four years ago, Danning was just one of thousands of Kanga Cup participants at the annual junior soccer tournament in Canberra.

Except that even back then, the striker stood out a little bit above the crowd. In 2003, while playing in the under-12 s competition, and 2005, in the under-15s, Danning took home the award for Player of the Tournament in those two divisions.

Danning is part of an impressive list of Kanga Cup best player winners that have gone on to play for Australia. As well as Danning, there is Matilda Jenna Tristram, former Young Socceroo Shaun Ontong and current Australian under-20 and under-17 representatives Sam Munro, Chris Bush, Christine Walters and Ashleigh Sykes.

 But Danning remembers his Kanga Cup’s particularly well, because they were some of the only chance for him to play against opposition outside Canberra.

 The Ghana-born striker didn’t play for the Capital Football Academy, ACT Academy of Sport or ACT representative teams as a junior, preferring instead to play for his ACT club team Canberra FC in the junior league.

 “It was a really good tournament because you get to play against teams from others states and other countries and that was really good because it gave me another aspect to the game that I didn’t have,” he said.

“I wanted to prove myself against other players and see how I compared and it was a great chance to do that, to see where I needed to improve and what I could work on.

 “It was a great tournament as well, always lots of fun.”

Since then Danning’s career has quickly moved right to the top. After a year at the Australian Institute of Sport, he signed for Sydney FC’s youth team in 2008. He then scored two goals in his first three A-League games. He was then selected for his first Australian squad this year and made his debut for the Australian under-20s on a tour of Holland.

Danning said his advice to this year’s Kanga Cup players would just be to keep working hard.

“First of all to always have fun, that’s the most important thing,” Danning said. “And always to try and improve and always give it one hundred percent even if your team isn’t doing so well.”

The 2009 Kanga Cup awards will be presented today.

The cream of the crop - Former Kanga Cup award winners who have gone on to represent Australia

Jenna Tristram
Who they play for now - Queensland Roar W-League, Matildas
Kanga Cup best player in -  1999, Holiday Coast under-14s, 2001 Coffs-Coast under-19

Shaun Ontong
Who they play for now -  Newcastle Jets A-League, [has played for Australian under-17 Joeys, Australian under-20s, Young Socceroos]
Kanga Cup best player in -  1999, Belwest Puma’s under-12

Sam Munro
Who they play for now - Sydney FC National Youth League, Australian under-20s
Kanga Cup best player in -  2002, Belsouth under-12

Chris Bush
Who they play for now -  AIS, Australian under-17 Joeys
Joeys caps, 4.
Kanga Cup best player in -  2003, STFA White, under-11

Kofi Danning
Who they play for now -  Sydney FC A-League, Australian under-20s
Kanga Cup best player in - 2003, Canberra FC Under-12, 2005 Canberra FC under-15

Ashleigh Sykes
Who they play for now - Canberra United, Young Matildas
Kanga Cup best player in -  2006, Dubbo Devils under-15

Christine Walters
Who they play for now – Canberra United, Young Matildas
Kanga Cup best player in – 2005, Woden Globetrotters, under -15

Isaiah’s older brother Blake won the same award last year and according to dad, Simon, it’s an accolade they’re keen to keep in the family in future.

“I’ve got another younger son as well so now he’s got something to live up to in the coming years, he’s seven years old playing in the under-10’s this year,” Mr Potts said.

Isaiah’s achievement is all the more impressive considering that, like his older brother last year, Isaiah was playing a year above his age group at the tournament.

According to Mr Potts, living in Griffith, NSW, means it’s not always easy for Isaiah or his brothers to showcase their skills, making their trip to Kanga Cup each year that much more special.

“It’s difficult because we have to travel so far to play in big tournaments and get competitive football,” he said.

“The boys have been looking forward to this since last July. We count it down, it’s a fantastic tournament, it’s a fantastic time away for us for families, but they love the Kanga Cup, they think it’s fantastic”, Mr Potts said.

Another of the night’s award recipients was the President of Capital Football, John Logue, who was honoured as the volunteer of the tournament.

Logue, who has been involved in the staging of the Kanga Cup in various roles for over a decade, accepted the award on behalf of all the event’s hardworking volunteers.

I’m lucky, I just happen to have the time to put into it but without all the volunteers the Kanga Cup just wouldn’t take place or if it did, it wouldn’t be nearly as good as it is,” Logue said.

Tareq Van Ogestrum was honoured as the tournaments top referee.

Van Ogestrum, from Brisbane, is officiating in his first Kanga Cup and said the experience was one he’s keen to repeat.

“It’s a great honour and I am privileged and I have had an enjoyable week with lots of new experiences and made new friends amongst all the referees,” Van Ogestrum said.

On the night however there was perhaps no one prouder than the Potts parents who have dreams of one day seeing at least one of their talented sons representing Australia.

Isaiah’s thoughts on the matter?

Small-sided games are taking over Australian soccer and the Kanga Cup is leading the way in introducing junior players to Footballer Federation Australia’s new structure.

Small-sided games are an FFA initiative that is designed to give junior players a better introduction into the skills and set-up of the game on a smaller pitch with less players.

Overall the FFA’s small-sided games plan hopes to have juniors up to 11 years of age playing different sized games to the full 11 v 11 on senior-sized pitches.  These two different age-groups have had a chance to experience what the new curriculum will look like at this year’s Kanga Cup.

This year all the under-10s and under-11s boys and girls are playing by the official FFA rules, which is seven v seven on a 40 metres x 30m field. The goals and balls are also smaller. In the under11s, they are playing nine v nine on a field that is 60m by 40m.

 While almost all clubs around Australia have implemented the small-sided games for competitions up to under-8s as per the FFA guidelines last year, most states in Australia haven’t put in place small-sided games for age-groups above that.

Capital Football’s leagues have been playing the smaller sided games for years, but it is a new structure for almost all of the interstate teams visiting at this year’s Kanga Cup.

 But for those that have been trying out the new league, they think it has been a good challenge.

The Queens Park under-11s team that James McKechnie coaches plays 11-a-side on full-pitches up in Sydney, but said he the small-sided game experience would be valuable for his team.

“I don’t think you should be playing on full size pitches until after 12-years-old, sometimes you can see before that age there might be one or two bigger athletic players that just dominate the competition because of their size and their team does well because of that, in the small-sided games it takes that out,” McKechnie said. “The smaller fields and smaller goals, it does make it harder to score, but it’s good to have a different challenge.”

It’s McKechnie’s second Kanga Cup this year after he brought an under-12 Queens Park team to the Canberra tournament.  “I’m hoping to bring more teams as well, for under-10s, under-11s, under-12s, it really is a great tournament for them, it’s a great place to come too and it’s well run,” he said.

  Brisbane Athletic under-10 boys cup coach Dennis Mulligan around half his team play full-pitch, but the other half play nine-a-side. So to go further down to seven-a-side on even smaller pitches was hard, but Mulligan said it was good to have a challenge.

“I think it’s very good for them to experience different conditions, different fields and the small-sided games,” Mulligan said.

“We do play a very expansive game and use long-balls and we’ve have to condense that and everything with it, but it’s good for something different.

“I can see why they want to adopt a difference approach, there are a lot of players with different size and skill and it’s still quite a difficult game.”

Roma is in South-West Queensland, six hours from Brisbane with a population of just 7000.

Most of the team came to Canberra in a minibus. Some parents also came on their own cars, but all made the trip down by car.

Instead it was on Roma’s day off on Tuesday, the entire team, coaches and parents all went to the Selwyn snowfields for a day in the white stuff.

“Rugby League is still very much the main code up in Roma, but we are certainly building,” Lumsden said. 

Caleb Creber, Pierce Leahy and Nathan Callaghan all made a number of attacking runs and at the other end though, Roma’s goal-keeper Braden Creber was called into action often during the game and in the second-half made some spectacular saves to keep Majura out.

But Majura ran out to a 5-0 win. In their second-game yesterday, they controlled the play again and had a number of chances.

They kept the top of the table Monaro Panthers to just a 1-0 lead at half-time, before the score finished up at 4-0 in favour of the Panthers.

“They just played like champions and they’ve had a great time.”

“It’s been lots of fun,” 11-year-old Pierce Leahy said.