Bears Touch

Report by Ian Kalms
The great NFL Coach, Vince Lombardi once remarked “I firmly believe that any man's finest hour, the greatest fulfilment of all that he holds dear, is that moment when he has worked his heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on the field of battle - victorious.”

Vince's comments are probably the best way to summarise the feelings of our performance at State Cup. After 11 games the team was overjoyed at our success in being crowned the 2011 State Cup Senior Mixed Champions (back-to-back titles 2010 and 2011), but we certainly made life difficult for ourselves and it was a hard road to get the job done in the end.

After the eight round games we ended up finishing third in our pool. Unfortunately we lost to Wagga Wagga and Balmain and whilst this was not what we had planned it was not completely unexpected. The Wagga Wagga side was very strong and we have developed a great rivalry with Balmain over recent times and the games are always close.

The one thing that gave us a great deal of confidence was watching a video of our game against Balmain and also the game between Wagga and Balmain on the Saturday night. We all seemed to look at each other and realised that we were way better than what we had been playing and it was time to step up. I think it dawned on us that we could still win State Cup, no matter what. Thanks to Dougie for doing the video work, you are a Champion!

When Sunday came around we had one more round game and then a qualifying final against East's which we won fairly easily. This then sent us into a semi final against Balmain. Due to the draw, Balmain had a bye in the Sunday morning round game and because they finished in the top two, it ended up being their first game and our 3rd game of the day. After being down by two tries for most of the game, rather than playing an up tempo game Balmain slowed the game down which meant we could rest our weary legs. We were lucky enough to even the scores up 3 all with only minutes to go. In the end we prevailed in a drop off to win 4-3 with Eric scoring the winning try. It was a herculean effort by the team.

This meant a show down with Wagga Wagga in the Grand Final. Fortunately for us, the sun was out and it was a nice hard dry track....something we had been wishing for all weekend. Plus we saved our best for last! It is pretty pleasing as coach to say that we played the best game of our State Cup in the Grand Final. We led for most of the game but Wagga were able to draw level at 5 all with only 90 seconds to go. I questioned Andy for wanting to run our kick off move again even though we had scored from it earlier in the game (surely they will cover it this time?), but Andy ran a variation of it and scored which meant we took the lead and just had to hold them out for the last 30 seconds. In the end we won the Grand Final 6 - 5. A special mention to Mark 'Ana' Seeto who was Player of the Final.

You need a fair bit of luck to win a State Cup, whether it is no injuries, a favourable draw, and the right conditions. However you have to put yourself in the position to take advantage of that luck. To this end the team were incredibly dedicated and trained hard throughout the campaign. Our team would have been easily the fittest side in our competition so when it was needed all the fitness and hard work definitely paid off. Well done team!

But, often at State Cup it's not always the touch footy you remember, some of our fond memories and highlights were:

* The deer in the headlights look on Mark's face when he saw the coach's gridiron pass coming his way - Leave it to Joe Montana and Jerry Rice coach!;
* Bec ignoring the coach's call to dump the ball and sending him on a 60m sprint to the line. And the coach getting there without breaking down;
* Kate wearing her shorts backwards for most of day one, the whole team didn't even notice. However when she wore them the correct way we lost a game, so for the rest of State Cup she wore them backwards including the Grand Final...it became our good luck charm;
* Andrew looking up from the line in triumph ("Yippee I'm off the nudey run") only to see 2 defenders, the referee, and at least a dozen spectators laughing at him as he lay with the ball on the 5m line against Murwillumbah;
* Coach says "okay everyone, do your own warm ups now" - The Ange and Bec warm up - both stand with arms on hips with 1 leg out in front slightly bent, this goes on for several minutes and if lucky, they might decide to stretch the other leg;
* When doing the 'truck and trailer' warm up drill, Phil stops and says, "lets change directions", but then keeps going the same way;
* Dougie cooking sausages on his portable BBQ in the tent, how good were they;
* Oliver (Kate's little boy) eats a piece of mango, crawls on top of Andy while he is lying down relaxing after a hard game and then Oliver sneezes on Andy's face.....Andy ended up wearing the mango - Gold! We have never seen Sojun laugh so hard;
* At the end of every night Andrew 'Baby' Stergio would play his guitar and sing some of our favourite songs....what a great way to relax at the end of the day;
* Eric's triumph in the "Battle of Balmain" at the end of the semi final - 20 cracks at the line, about 4 penalties, at least 3 valid tries, but at long last one was awarded to send us into the Grand Final;
* But when Eric scores in the semi final drop off, the coach watches the rest of the team run on to celebrate forgetting that Balmain has to have a chance with the ball (the coach definitely wasn't Kalm then)
* But the best of all - the jubilation on everyone's face when we beat Wagga Wagga in the Grand Final. Made all the more special as we did it the hard way.

To finish, other teams always congratulated and praised our North's team regarding the great spirit in which we play our touch footy. This is testament to each of the individuals that make up the team and I am very proud and honoured to coach this fantastic group of players and friends. This is a great forum to thank each of them individually and collectively for their contributions and efforts both on and off the field. To my team mates in the North's Senior Mixed team and State Cup Champions for 2011 - Angie, Amy, Bec, Kate, Shar, Wendy, Andrew, Baby, Eric, Haz, Mark, Phil and Sojun - Thankyou!

Now we can look forward to 2012 and see if North's can become the first club to win a hat-trick of State Cup Senior Mixed titles. 

Report to come

Report by Cameron Byrne

The Norths Men's Open B Team had a strong campaign, but were unfortunately defeated in the round of 16 by the current Division 1 Vawdon Cup champions, Hornsby.

Despite defeating the same Hornsby side in the round games, the Men's side were unfortunate not to progress through to the quarter finals.
An earlier narrow defeat to Wallsend and a draw against Nelson Bay made it difficult to progress from the group in top spot, which would have ensured a more favourable draw. The team managed to finish 3rd in the group, in what was a very competitive pool.

Though this was arguably the strongest and most prepared of the Men's B sides that has competed at State Cup over the last 3 years, the results were not up to the teams high expectations, having previously reached the quarter finals in 2009 and 2010.

Positives to be taken from this year's tournament however, include the emergence of young gun, Saxon Fischer Gray, the continuous improvement of Andy Gonzalvez, Mark Preston and Mick Ingram and the strong leadership of newcomer Inshan Sheriff.

Honourable mentions also go to Glenn Castle and Julian Vertley who made the trip from Queensland to join the team and had very good tournaments despite not being able to train with the team.

Thanks also to James Salvaggio, Co-Captain, Russel Watsford, Head Coach and Tim Harris, Manager who each  provided strong support, direction and leadership to the team throughout 2011.

After finishing Vawdon Cup as undefeated minor premiers, the future of the team looks bright. 2012 promises to be an exciting year for the Norths Men's team.

Report to come