Chris Guyton

THOMASVILLE – The Thomasville Bulldogs have a new football coach – a new flag football coach that is.

The school announced the first head coach in the program’s history as Chris Guyton, the team’s track and field coach.

Guyton is excited about helping start the program from scratch but understands there is plenty of work to be done between now and when the season starts in the fall.

“It’s going to be a challenge getting started off. Ideally, I would have wanted to be named back in May, because that’s when teams were eligible to hold tryouts and have practice days,” Guyton said. “At this point, I don’t have a team. I don’t have a roster. I’ve still got to have an interest meeting, while the school is out this summer. And then I’m bound by the GHSA rules of, we can’t have a team practice but we can have small group practices.

“We’re facing some challenges, but I do think in the end we’re going to be okay.”

Guyton said he hoped to have an interest meeting with potential players next week, though he admitted there was already a buzz about the sport during the final few weeks of school.

“Absolutely there’s a buzz. One advantage that I think I do have, a lot of the interest that I heard was coming from the girls track team. That’s a positive, and then, just listening around the school even before I was a candidate, kids that I didn’t even know, walking through the hallways at the high school, I would just hear them talk about how they were interested,” Guyton said.

“The challenge is going to be getting some of those kids who are probably out of town, getting them for an interest meeting.”

Guyton said a schedule has been made for the upcoming season, though it is preliminary. According to the GHSA, the earliest date for flag football practice is Sept. 9 and the earliest date for a flag football game is Sept. 30.