Under 13s
The Under 13 Noosa Dolphins have secured a second undefeated premiership managing to keep their opposition, Brothers, scoreless in a grand final showdown at Sunshine Coast Stadium.
It was an exceptional display of clinical rugby that delighted the coaching team and impressed the crowd.
Head coach Roger Lee, in his seventh year of coaching the team, credited each player for their commitment and hard work throughout the season to achieve the end result. Since entering the competitive age group last year, the team has been a force to be reckoned with not only in the local Sunshine Coast Rugby competition, but also against much bigger and stronger sides holding their own as runners up at the annual invitational King of Country down at the Gold Coast earlier in the season.
Congratulations to coaches Roger, Rohan and Albie, the players, and their supportive families, for another successful season to be proud of. And above all, congratulations to the boys!
Under 11s
It seemed fitting to play our final game of season in wet conditions against a large Matthew Flinders side who had been hard to beat in earlier season encounters. Keen to show off their ball skills despite the rain, the Dolphin U11s consistently offloaded and moved the ball while maintaining possession.
This led to Riley’s first try for the year. What a great way to finish your season, Riley.
The boys were hungry for more points and created more ball movement and hard running ending in further tries to Lenny and two to Luke.
All boys showed massive character and skills improvements over the season, turning around a slow start to the season to end the season with four straight wins with some exemplary playing in each.
Well done boys. Many thanks to all the parents, especially coaches Andrew and Blair. We are looking forward to keeping up our skills, with an U11 Dolphins touch footy side kicking off this week.
Under 10s
Reds – The last game of the U10 Reds season was also perhaps the coldest, with the Kawana stadium ovals presenting troublesome wind and light rain for the match against Maroochydore. The slippery conditions led to lots of mishandling of the ball, before the Reds found a rhythm against a gritty Swans outfit.
A lack of support for those making good runs up the field such as Alby, Duke, Zac, Jake, Kai and Max led to lots of isolation and unfortunate turnovers to the Maroochy side.
Connor, Caesar and Patrick maintained position to stymie the opposition runs, while committed tackling from the likes of Cooper, Ollie, Ryker, James and Oscar showed courage and tenacity, and these combined proved instrumental in the final winning score to the Reds.
Alby was awarded Domino’s Pizza Player of the Match for a strong tackling game and a try to boot. It’s been a pleasure watching these boys develop as players and support each other as a team. Well done on a fantastic season boys, coaches and families.
Under 9s
The morning was dark and stormy as we drove to Brothers for the final round against the mighty Swans.
The opposition looked intimidating until the even mightier Dolphins ran out to face their foe. The Swans went wide at the start and caught us napping for an early try, but from the ensuing kick-off Monty raced up the centre linking with Hugo who in turned slickly passed to Eric. It was a brilliant passage of play.
Shortly after Miller broke away for a strong run and the first of his three tries. The arm wrestle was on, the boys dug in against some determined attack with Harvey and Ben making strong tackles. Mason was strong with a couple of stunning try savers.
Now it was time for the hard work and Emmerson was the man, he was everywhere in tight, tackling, mauling and cleaning out.
Then we saw Jake making a surging run on the back of a bone rattler from Mason, resulting in a well-worked try to Ben. Following a try saver from Tom, the turnover saw Miller run the length of the field for a try. It was try for try and a barging run from Zac nearly saw us break the deadlock. Closing in on half time the Swans were looking dangerous. The half-time score 3-4, it was tight.
We lifted a gear in the second half and the final score was 8-6 to the Dolphins.
It was a brilliant game to finish the season and the Domino’s Pizza Player of the Match was awarded jointly to the whole team such was the quality of the game.
