Black Diamond AFL 14/5

[Northern_Swan]

Two big grudge matches tomorrow in the BDAFL, with Cardiff hosting City and Killarney Vale hosting Terrigal.

The Killarney Vale match is being touted as the match of the round, with the Bombers 2005 resurgence being well and truly put to the test.

Our boys take on City in a game that always brings out the best in both sides. Both clubs will bring all of their "old boys" along and things should be quite interesting. Newcastle has copped an absolute soaking over the last few days & hopefully this won't have too much of an effect on the outcome. In fact all 3 grades should be good games, with both club's u/18 sides undefeated & City the only Undefeated side in the 2's.

In the other games, Warners Bay will travel to Gosford in a match both will be desperate for, given they are both stuck on 1 win each. The winless Wyong will host Nelson Bay & will hope to get on the board this week. Nelson Bay are notorious for their travel jitters & this could give Wyong the sniff they need to get on the board.


www.bdafl.com.au for all the stats & Black Diamond News

[shearer]

Northern Swan,

What happens in Newcastle if the grounds are rain affected? Is it the same as in Sydney where pissweak councils call the game off if someone even spits on the turf?

[Jude4eva]

The games play in the rain thats what the tigers did last week

[Northern_Swan]

There are 5 councils that have BDAFL Grounds in their area- Port Stephens, Newcastle, Lake Macquarie, Wyong & Gosford- each with different ideas

When you play AT City, three spits on a cigarette paper generally is enough to call a game off- it is heavily council influenced, though when West Newcastle were still around they were given much more leeway.

Our ground our call (LMCC arent too concerned)
Warners Bay & lake Macquarie are the same

Nelson Bay's ground (like most of the Nelson Bay area) is sand based and it never really gets sloppy unless they are lining the arc up around the front.

Not so sure about the grounds on the Central Coast but as J4E alluded to, Gosford usually have their own call, so it would stand to reason Terrigal & Woy Woy would have a similar call (Gosford Council)

Wyong & Killarney however have similar problems to City i think (Wyong council are pretty well known as being difficult to work with)- in saying that, the Central Coast have largely missed rain over the last 2 days.


Hope that explains it!!

[Pekay]

i find it a shame that players are pulling out of what seemed a very strong BDAFL rep team.i can understand Rhinos not going,probably cant stray to far from base,but bad news about Cambourn and Bubbles pulling out.but at the end of the day,footy dont pay the bills...how is it looking North?and do you know if Mick Solomons(Pickles) is still at Killarney?havent seen him named yet..

[Northern_Swan]

i find it a shame that players are pulling out of what seemed a very strong BDAFL rep team.i can understand Rhinos not going,probably cant stray to far from base,but bad news about Cambourn and Bubbles pulling out.but at the end of the day,footy dont pay the bills...how is it looking North?and do you know if Mick Solomons(Pickles) is still at Killarney?havent seen him named yet..

Yea its a shame- we're having similar problems with the 18's rep too- Ryno is busy with work at present and will be a week-to-week proposition for us for about another month- but he's happy, normally its the pointy end of the season when he has those problems (like last year's finals where he flew back from brissy on sat mornings for the games). The Rep team will still (hopefully) be competitive- i'm just wondering who they are going to bring in to replace the withdrawals- it will leave them with a poor preparation none the less.

Rumour has it some of the Killarney boys have pulled out because "they can't be stuffed playing rep footy" (abovementioned names included) so in that respect it is pretty poor.


Sorry mate know nothing about Solomons.

[Coastal Boy]

Pekay, I try to get along to KV training for a kick. I have been introduced to a guy named "Pickles" only last week. I will endeavour to dig deeper. I know Cambourn, Percy and Bubbles have been working very hard and long hours which is having an big impact on their availability to train. Only their playing ability is keeping them on track. Cambourn is just getting over a bad ankle sprain and Percy has been out too. This could explain some of the reluctance to play reps and make to necessary effort to attend rep training. Again I will do some snooping. As for Adelaide street Oval, the council is inclined to close the field for training but is generally excellent when it comes to opening it for game day. It gets funny when the ground closes again for training the following week when little rain drops in between.

[Nedra]

The same rumour (Rep Footy) was posted on another club's website as well. All players have valid excuses I would have thought. Austerberry is in partnership at his work; Cambourn and Percy both missed significant time at work with their injuries so to ask for my time off, is probably pushing it a bit, albeit only 1 day.

Did you have a run at the weekend Coastal Boy against T/A?

[Coastal Boy]

I dont play with KV but just train with them. A good bunch of blokes too. I can tell you their 'big buying spree' as was mentioned earlier in this forum was a little off the mark. They hoped to attract players with a few bucks but it didnt happen. They had a few jobs going to attract footballers onto the coast but I dont think that amounted to anything much either. I am pretty sure the big names are playing for no dosh. Cambourn is an ex-junior, Bubbles is mates with him from Sydney, Kolby from Vic just walked in the door along with all the other new recruits I believe.

[Northern_Swan]

All those blokes you mentioned are on at least 100 a game as well as Percy- they offered money all over the shop to blokes in the league from about every club- including Wyong, Gosford, Warners Bay and Lake Macquarie. They will have spent over 20K on players by seasons end.

By the way Bubbles is working for his dad & couldn't be stuffed playing rep footy (his words)

[Coastal Boy]

Northern, I was bold last night and made a phone call to ask about some of the points you mentioned. The answers to my questions were quite candid and naturally some of the information I will not repeat. Incidently I am a sponsor of the club and have copies of their financials over the past three years.
There are 5 players receiving what is described as petrol money to attend training and games. (Considering the price of petrol any amount here wont be enough.) They did contact a few players however none really took things far enough to really meet and talk dollars. Of their new recruits only Brad Percy is from the BDAFL and he contacted them last year citing he was not wanted by Cardiff. The budget for players and coaches is 5K-10K and knowing their sponsorship situation(which has improved this year) I know they cannot afford any more. If you take out Bubbles, Cambourn, Percy, Kolby and the few ex-goannas I cannot even think of any other recruits at all. So they only really have 8 or 9 extra players on last year. I cannot see no spending spree of $100+ per game in any of that. Tell me if your mail differs from this. Does this differ from the financial situation with the Newcastle clubs of the BDAFL?

[Northern_Swan]

I know for fact that Cardiff do not pay players. I am 95% sure that niether of the bay's do either. Newcastle City I am not sure about, i'm pretty sure they were paying Coulloupas but i'm not sure they pay anyone this year.

Players from the clubs I mentioned were offered money up front- i.e "come play for us we will give you$xxxx" Obviously I won't name specific names or clubs but 1 player was offered a 5 figure sum to captain coach.

Brad Percy was never "not wanted" by Cardiff. He left because he was contacted and offered money. He hit Cardiff up for a 2005 payment at the end of last season & he was told that the club does not pay players. You will notice his initial clearance was refused as he actually owed the club money.

Personally, i'm not that concerned that Brad left the club. If he is not happy then so be it. But if he was so unhappy at Cardiff why did he sit with the Cardiff supporters when KV & Cardiff met?

What I am concerned with is the fact that KV did approach players from other clubs- and struggling clubs at that. (have a look at the one's i have mentioned) If a club, any club for that matter wants to better themselves by bringing in those from outside the league, good luck to them. But poaching (or attepmting to in this case) from struggling clubs to improve their spot on the ladder by a few rungs in my book is very poor form.

[Jude4eva]

Nelsons bay players depends on whos at the RAAF that week and if they can play or not.

Can tell you for a fact gosford dont play for players.... gosford tend to pride on the development of there juniors more than trying to "poach" players

[Coastal Boy]

Northern, I feel your last comment in particular is quite valid. Personally I do not feel paying players is the answer and would applaud an amateur league. KV might be shooting themselves in the foot as they may get known as 'the club that pays'(though I say it's not true) and no one will go near them without asking for cash. Current players will hold out wanting more money if they feel the club cannot afford to lose them. The fact remains though that in the Sydney AFL players jump from team to team every year and its mostly driven by money and people accept it as a fact of life. In my thinking it would be a different situation if a premiership team went out and sucked the talent from all of the other clubs. KV only won a hand full of games over 2 years and if you were in their shoes you might feel something drastic was necessary. But as it turned out only one player was 'poached' and no harm was done. I applaud the board for getting off their butts and having a go. I reckon the competition needed another team to rival the Cardiff/Terrigal dominance and if anything KV should be exalted for improving the overall standard of the BDAFL.