Sport
17 May, 2022
Towns present combined new women’s league team
A FIERCE Tableland town rivalry has been pushed aside for the betterment of rugby league as the Mareeba Gladiators and Atherton Roosters join hands to put forward a combined ladies team in this years Far North Queensland Rugby League competition.
A FIERCE Tableland town rivalry has been pushed aside for the betterment of rugby league as the Mareeba Gladiators and Atherton Roosters join hands to put forward a combined ladies team in this years Far North Queensland Rugby League competition.
The team of around 30 ladies contains a mix of players from both Atherton and Mareeba who have joined hands to play in the upcoming rugby league season, their first game being played this weekend.
While the Roosters were able to compete and field a side last season, injuries plagued them and by the time they made it to the end of the season, they had three of their original players. Roosters manager and player for the combined team Kylie Willson said they needed a bigger team of ladies to compete effectively.
“Last year we did have good numbers but we found injuries were massive so at the end of the season we were down to about three of our original ladies,” she said. “We learnt from last year that we need a big number of women to progress forward, we had good registration at the start of the year but we have had to wait a bit of a long time before starting the season.”
The ladies started their pre-season training and preparations in January however they are due to play their first game this Saturday night against Edmonton Storm in Atherton. While playing in Mareeba the team will field Gladiators jerseys and while playing in Atherton they will wear Atherton jerseys, when playing away, the jerseys will alternate.
Mareeba Gladiators president John Arcidiacono said getting women on the field playing footy was more important than town rivalry.
“Both towns were down on numbers, but we wanted to push for a women’s comp so there was a discussion and we decided that we would combine and make a Tablelands team,” he said. “You have to put the rivalry aside for the sake of rugby league, both Mareeba and Atherton want their women’s competition to grow. “We can see this as a way forward of doing that.”
