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“A BETTER bloke you won’t find.”
That’s how friends, teammates, the rugby world and the wider Quirindi community will remember Nicholas Tooth.
Taken too soon, the shock death of the popular 25-year-old local in a freak head collision during a first-grade rugby match on Saturday has rocked the New England, and the wider rugby and sporting fraternity.
Nick was a keen rugby union player and boasted connections with not only the Quirindi Lions, but Eastern Suburbs and his current Sydney team, the Woollahra Colleagues Rugby Club.
“It is with great sadness we mourn the loss of Nick Tooth, a well-loved Colleague and great mate to all. Toothy was an integral member of the Burke Cup Premiership team from last year and was due to be back with us in the coming weeks,” the Woollahra Colleagues posted online yesterday.
“A better bloke you won’t find. RIP Toothy.”
Understandably it’s shattered Nick’s Lions team-mates who have been rallying around one another to remember the “Toothy” they loved, after he suffered a head knock during the second half of Saturday’s game, before succumbing to his injuries on Sunday afternoon.
“They’re all in shock,” Quirindi Lions president Charles Murray told The Leader.
“They’re having trouble coming to grips with it. (But) they’re sticking together ... we’ll get through it together.”
He said the club met on Sunday afternoon and counsellors would be made available to the players.
“We’ve just got to keep them together, keep them talking,” Mr Murray said. “Make sure they get it all out in the open.”
The family has had a long association with the club, with Nick a Lions junior, and still travelled home from Sydney for the occasional game, like he did on Saturday.
“He played all his junior rugby and early senior rugby with Quirindi,” Mr Murray said.
“Nick was a very likeable person. He had a larrikin streak in him.”
Nick was residing in Sydney where he was progressing with a career in the grains industry after completing his agriculture economics degree at Sydney University.
He hailed from Wallabadah and was a clear standout on the field, pulling on the navy and red for Eastern Suburbs for several seasons.
“We were very happy to have him for five seasons or so,” vice-president of rugby Hamish McCathie said, with the club remembering the grin that “would hold court on the deck after the game”.
He coached Nick during some of his time with the club and remembered a man that was much loved and very popular.
“Nick was a gentleman. The kind of player that would play any position and any grade,” he said. “When he got dropped he’d work even harder and with a smile on his face.”