Harry Snook's first season in Sydney didn't quite go as planned, but the Tamworth young gun still took plenty away from the experience.
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Snook was in the midst of his first full season in the Sydney Premier Rugby Competition (he played a few games with Gordon at the start of last season) and plying his trade with Eastwood's firsts colts when the Delta outbreak in the city saw the competition suspended.
It was later to be cancelled for just the fifth time in it's 147-year history and for the first time since the first World War.
For Snook it was a disappointing end to a season he had really been enjoying.
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He had been able to cement a spot in the first grade colts side, which was a goal, and was relishing the opportunity to play five-eighth. It was where he had played a lot of his school football and the position, moving down to Sydney, he was wanting to play.
A "lot different" to school footy, and even local first grade, at the start he said there was "a lot of information and content to take on board", but he felt like he was really starting to find his feet.
"Obviously the first few games of the season it was a big learning curve," Snook said.
"We were just about to reach the half-way point of the season, I was at the point where I knew the content good enough to build on it."
That "behind the scenes stuff" was probably the biggest thing Snook said he took away. The commitment that is involved and the "work that goes in off the field and off the training field as well, preparing for each game."
As well as training three times a week, and doing gym sessions most days, he would at home be looking over reviews of the previous weekends game and previews of the upcoming game.
In amongst all that he was studying a bachelor of business through UTS, and working doing some rugby coaching at Riverview and at the aquatic centre at PLC Pymble.
One of the most disappointing parts of the timing of the competition suspension was that Snook's Eastwood side were due to face Randwick, who long-time team-mate Mitch Watts was playing with, the coming weekend.
"Since we were 12 or 13 we've been playing with each other. I think I've played against him maybe once," Snook recalled.
It was shaping as an intriguing battle with Mitch's brother Nathan at Eastwood with Snook, and another former school-mate Will Burnett (he went to Calrossy for the first three years of high school) at Randwick.
"That was calendar date for us, we were counting down to that," he said.
But while that never eventuated, they did get to play together, suiting up for the Magpies after returning to Tamworth.
Snook said he initially saw it more as a good opportunity to see his family. He thought he'd be back pulling on the Eastwood blue and white in a couple of weeks.
When the lockdown was then extended (for the first time), he "jumped at the chance" to play with the Magpies - until things restarted down in Sydney.
But as the lockdown dragged on, the "writing was on the wall" and so he turned his focus towards the Magpies' season.
"I was really enjoying that," he said of playing with them again.
But then the pandemic reached the region and scuppered his season for the second time.
With uni all online, Snook is planning to stay in Tamworth and work through the summer, going down to Sydney for pre-season training when he can.