The Yass Magpies campaign to rejoin the Group 8 Rugby League competition in 2016 looks to be progressing smoothly. “We had 44 players from all grades here last week”, quipped President Greg Smith at last Thursday’s training.
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The Magpies had arranged a trial match against the Group 9 team the Tumut Blues in the middle of next month; but another commitment for the Blues forced this match to be cancelled. However, a trial match against a team from Moruya has been planned for late March; that game will be at Walker Park.
“I think Coach Scott Naughton only wants the one trial before the competition starts” said Greg Smith. “A few of the older players have been a bit slow coming back to training after a long summer break” Smith continued.
There is also a concern amongst many of the Group 8 Clubs that Queanbeyan and Goulburn have emerged to dominate the competition by virtue of their support by big registered clubs and as such, have the buying power to deny the best players to the remaining members of Group 8.
“At Yass, we can’t compete with that sort of financial strength and the Canberra Raiders may lend us a few of their NRL lower order players to help us a bit this year” Greg Smith remarked.
The Group 8 CRL competition is regarded as a “Tier One” competition which ranks equal with Northern Rivers, Newcastle and Wollongong in Country Championships. Though commendable that Group 8 can retain potential NSW Cup and NRL players, it is rather lopsided that these players are distributed amongst just a few teams within the Raiders Cup competition.
“Our league tag team is rapidly filling up with numbers and the girls are as keen as to get back to the game, Cam Hardy has offered to help coach them this year” Greg added.
There seems to be a renewed enthusiasm amongst the players at training, it will be a very tough step up from George Tooke Shield, and for some ex-Binalong players from Woodbridge Cup. Yass Magpies last played Group 8 under Mark Bell in 2012 and were narrowly defeated in the Qualifying Final at Seiffert Oval to see the two Queanbeyan teams fight it out in the Grand Final.
The coaches Scott and Steve Naughton were both members of that 2012 Magpies side and are more than qualified to lead the 2016 team out into the competition, heavyweight front-rowers will be hard to come by for them, however if they can win most of their home games and a couple of away fixtures, this will be a great start on the long road back.