PRIMARY school sport took centre stage across the region over the weekend as Tamworth hosted over 1500 junior athletes across 15 sports while Armidale saw 45 rugby sides from across the eastern seaboard battle it out for top honours in the annual The Armidale School Rugby Carnival.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Now into its 11th year, the carnival has grown into the largest primary-aged rugby carnival in the country, and this year saw 43 individual school and representative sides take part. Three of those were attending the carnival for the first time.
Among those was the Noosa Dolphins.
They made the eight-hour journey down with their U12s team after hearing about the carnival from another team from the Sunshine Coast.
“We got the ball rolling around October,” co-coach Rick Archer said.
They were one of the first teams to nominate and are planning to come back next year.
“It will be an ongoing thing for us,” Archer said.
He and Shannon Whitehill coach the side and said it was a fantastic weekend for the boys.
“Just all round. The rugby experience, the social experience,” Archer said.
They “threw their hat into the ring” for the top division and were just pipped in the final seconds of their final game to finish with two wins and two losses from their four games on the Saturday.
They played in a special Anzac-themed jersey, which they brought down with them, partly because of what it represents.
“The mateship of it. We wanted to teach the kids that when things aren’t going well you can rely on your mates,” Archer said.
It wasn’t just the rugby the kids were excited about either.
“All the boys wanted to have a photo in Hogwarts (dining hall),” he said.
Event convenor Will Caldwell was very happy with how the carnival went.
One of the great things about it, he believes is the diversity of the teams.
“Some of the match-ups you get,” he said.
“Like the Dalby Wheatmen against Tudor House.”
The other thing that is nice, he said, is that they try to let the teams experience playing on different fields. They had eight in operation over the weekend running at half hour intervals for 86 games on the Saturday.
Meanwhile in Tamworth, bus loads of primary school athletes arrived in town on Friday night ready for two days of non-stop action all across town.
The second year of the carnival brought record numbers and cemented it’s place on the primary sports calender as teams from all over NSW, southern Queensland and the ACT made the trip.
