Happy 2020 Colleagues and extended Colleagues community.
As the season approaches, I would like to update you on what has been happening down at Blue Giant Stadium in the off season.
Clubhouse
New floors were installed prior to Christmas. The previous floors were extremely damaged around the balcony area and were not able to be sanded back again. We have replaced them with an all purpose / weather floor that will give us much more durability, better acoustics and it looks fantastic!
New joinery will be installed next week at the northern end of the clubhouse to store merchandise and gear as well as wet weather training equipment. This will reduce the clutter sitting on floors and make the clubhouse a lot more functional and tidy.
Grants have been applied for to partially contribute to both of these projects. We have not been advised whether we were successful as yet.
Fields
Woollahra #2 and #3 look amazing. New turf has been laid across most of the fields and they are under constant groundskeeper maintenance in preparation for Cranbrook 1st XI summer cricket season. The new turf pitch will also allow our Colleagues cricket team to play some home ground features on Sundays over the summer. Watch this space for dates and summer events!!
The new digital scoreboard should be installed prior to the season start. This project has been delayed due to a redesign to allow for more than one grade scores appearing. The result will be a fantastic contribution to the grounds and spectator experience.
We have also applied for a grant to install storage cages and a cement pad for the scrum machine, to be located adjacent to the score board. Fingers crossed for this one.
Season Ahead
With a great 2019 campaign behind us we are looking forward to an even more successful 2020!
We are delighted to have a large chunk of our colts returning in 2020 into grade. There are several of these guys who will feel right at home in Kentwell having appeared off the bench on many occasions last year.
Rumour has it that recruitment has been hot and strong in the off season also.
We have a new strength and conditioning coach, Matt Mackay. Matt is a local eastern suburbs boy, playing many years of first grade at Randwick and more latterly having a run with Easts. Matt has been in high demand with invitational 7s teams across Australia and has been a personal trainer for the past 11 years. He has fought in two amateur fights and is a rugby tragic. Matt is running our Tuesday night and Saturday morning sessions and will also run drills prior to training on Thursday nights throughout the season.
If there are any of our old boys or friends of the club wanting to help out coaching or managing teams or in any capacity really, we would only be too grateful for your involvement. Please contact me directly.
Long Lunch
Please lock in Friday 8th May for the annual Colleagues Long Lunch. More details on entertainment etc to follow.
Old Colleagues Day will be held on the day after, Saturday 9th May. We will have a jumping castle for the kids and a food and drinks package for the old boys.
Sponsorship
We were exceptionally blessed with the support received in 2019 (see below sponsors logos) and we hope that we can maintain those relationships into 2020.
The social media committee worked overtime this year to promote these businesses and on ground exposure for our sponsors was fantastic.
As is always the case with an amateur rugby club, we run close to the line with finances. Ground hire fees are constantly increasing as are insurance costs to run such a large club.
If you or your business would like to discuss a partnership with the greatest amateur rugby club in Australia, arguably the world, please contact me directly (0418 246 460 or cameroni@agrow.com.au).
Colleagues Farewell two Colleagues Greats
As you are aware, the Colleagues family has lost two of its legends in early 2020.
John ‘Wal’ Corlis and Hans ‘Dutchy’ Lamens were both integral members of the Colleagues Rugby Club for many years.
To hear some stories, to pay your respects and get together with some old friends to farewell these two great men, we would like to welcome you down to Colleagues Clubhouse on Sunday 1st
March from 2:30pm.
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Keep an eye on the emails for fixtures, come down to the club and support and I look forward to seeing you throughout the season.
Kind regards,
Cam Ireland
0418 246 460