Singleton Shines in Dubbo
Singleton Junior Touch Football put the town on the map at the NSW Touch Junior State Cup Northern Conference in February with the under-18 boys’ side having two of their games live streamed on Kayo Sports.
Singleton Storm had nine teams travel to Dubbo on the last weekend in February to join about 9,000 other junior touch players and their supporters at the tournament.
The under-12 girls’ and boys’ sides both made it through to the round-of-16 before they were knocked out and the Under-10 girls made it into the semi-final undefeated, but unfortunately lost their semi.
The under-18 boys put on a great performance including a 2-all draw with Manly and a 7-all draw with competition favourites Maitland. They were lucky enough to also have two of their games live streamed on Kayo.
“It was so funny, the commentators had to look up where Singleton was on Google,” said Singleton President Craig Gradwell.
“They were knocked out in the end, but it was extremely close.”
Riley Maytom was named the under-18 boys player of the tournament.
Craig is still beaming about how proud he is of everyone.
“These campaigns have highs and lows, but we came away stronger. Both our players and spectators demonstrated respect for our referees and opposition spectators and I believe everyone got to know each other better.
“They all competed at extremely high levels. Singleton was up there playing against the bigger clubs that usually get all the recognition and three teams made the finals.
“Our club just gets the numbers we need to field a side in each age group and the weekend showed we are still very competitive against those bigger clubs.”
It wasn’t just the players who came away winners at the tournament.
Tom Donehue, one of the Singleton touch referees was appointed to oversee the under-12 boys grand final and Barry Nichols, the Singleton Junior Touch President was selected in the Australian referee’s contingent for the 2024 World Cup.
-JESSICA ROWSE