Credit to Tonner’s passion

NORTH Queensland Cowboys’ former chief executive Greg Tonner resigned yesterday and it’s important to reflect on the past four seasons he’s had at the club.

Mr Tonner, though he grew up in Townsville and studied here, was always something of a square peg in a round hole.

He’d enjoyed a successful career in IT and telecommunications and had most recently been working in the corporate world in Sydney.

He’s a wide- eyed, blue sky, big ideas man.

He was not the sort of person you’d expect to be in charge of a North Queensland sporting side.

And that was no more apparent than at the launch of the 2018 season when a lunchtime crowd packed out the Townsville Entertainment and Convention Centre.

When the CEO took to the stage he asked the crowd to get on their feet, to hold hands around the table, to close their eyes and to visualise Cowboys once again becoming Premiers in 2018.

There was awkward shuffling, the footy tragic crowd clearly uncomfortable with the approach.

But in a world where NRL clubs and their players feature all too often on the front pages of newspapers for all the wrong reasons, an attempt to transform a traditional culture is something to be applauded.

Sans the hand- holding, Mr Tonner’s time at the club should ultimately be remembered for the effort he put into the betterment of the broader community, which connected the team more closely with the town.

Simply put, Mr Tonner is a decent man and he’s been good for the town. He’s cared about the community as evidenced by the opening of NRL Cowboys House or school resilience programs.

As for the Cowboys, it’s the dawn of a new era and the right time for some changes. There’s a fantastic opportunity for the club to take stock, to rebuild and to bring the community along with it.