Noosa coach Brett Winkler said the cancellation of last year’s Sunshine Coast rugby league competition essentially forced the team to ‘start from scratch’.
The Pirates and their rivals missed out on a full year of action after the sport’s local governing body abandoned the season before it had begun, due to COVID-19.
Winkler said it’s cost them financially and fewer players have returned this year.
“We’ve got no momentum,” he said. “We’ve got to start from scratch.”
“The guys have had a year off and through natural attrition, many don’t come back.
“You need your players playing regularly to keep them, so we’ve dropped in numbers.”
While the local league season was cancelled last year, other local sports continued.
“So, we had some players who went to other codes and played, and some don’t come back,” Winkler said.
The Noosa Dolphins rugby union club gained from code-crossers, while Noosa Tigers AFL and Noosa Lions soccer are also well-organised and offer alternatives.
“If you don’t play, particularly when the opposing codes are playing, that makes it really hard,” Winkler said.
The Pirates have also suffered financially, with no spectators and sponsors last year.
“Those home games are the lifeblood to a club and it’s where we get a lot of revenue,” Winkler said.
They missed out on gate and canteen takings, while there is concern some sponsors won’t return, after not being involved in 2020.
“Sponsors go and do something else or take time off, and some of them have had a tough time through COVID,” Winkler said.
All local clubs face similar ramifications to last season’s cancellation but Winkler said the issues are compounded at the Pirates, who were already doing it tough.
Up and down years
The club’s A-grade team’s been in a state of flux during the past decade.
It struggled to be competitive and formed a joint venture with equally troubled Gympie Devils before going their own way again, only to withdraw from the competition mid-season in 2016, due to a lack of competitive numbers.
Noosa then won the grand-final, beating a Winkler-coached Maroochydore in 2017, when the Pirates were essentially propped up by Sunshine Coast Falcons-contracted players.
That affiliation wasn’t as strong in 2018 and they crashed to the wooden spoon.
Winkler then came on board in 2019 and he said the team “overachieved” to reach the finals.
Then came the 2020 season cancellation.
“Noosa’s been in struggling mode, bouncing up and down (for years),” Winkler said.
“If at any stage you go off the boil and you’re struggling, it takes a lot longer to get back on track.
“This is still really a big rebuild project.
“This is a rebuild job in terms of players and the club, to try and get back on deck and be a really consistent club.
“It’s a great club but it’s got its challenges and it’s a long plan for us to get back up there, but we’ll do our best.”
Ex-State of Origin star boosts Pirates
In the short term, Winkler wants the side to compete every week.
“If we can keep our focus on what’s directly ahead of us that will hopefully put us in a good position at the backend of the season and we’ll have a shot at making finals,” he said.
But this year’s side will be without Tom Murphy and also a trio of key players. Brad Kent, Bart Hold and Rohan Messer are returning to Maroochydore.
“We’ve got a bit of work to do. We’re still looking for a couple of other players,” Winkler said. “But we’re training well.”
The recruitment of ex-Queensland representative David Shillington is a huge boost.
The 37-year-old should add real starch, power and experience to the pack.
Shillington played more than 200 NRL games (for Canberra, Sydney and Gold Coast), along with 8 games for his state and 14 for his country, in a career spanning 2005 to 2016.
“He’s good on and off the field for the guys,” Winkler said.
“We’re hoping a few more players want to take that opportunity to play with Dave.
“He’s training well and in our last ball-work session he looked great.
“You can see his ability and class.”
The Pirates have also retained some players and there are many youngsters coming through the ranks at Noosa.
But some of their most talented junior products may not see a lot of A-grade. Seven of them were selected for the Sunshine Coast Falcons Mal Meninga squad (under-18).
Noosa was set to host a 9s carnival on February 5-6, but it was cancelled “because of a number of contributing factors”.
Rugby League Sunshine Coast will host a 9s carnival at Kawana on March 9.
The season proper is tentatively scheduled to start in mid-March.
