Suns AFLW gather for bonding
Club ‘politics’ leads to coach switch
IS this the player-driven team camp that could be the making of the Gold Coast Suns AFLW team?
On the banks of the NSW Northern Rivers town of Yamba, the newly-formed Suns women’s team gathered last Friday for a long-weekend aimed at forging the bonds necessary for any premiership contender.
Rivals already have relationships that have been built for three years and with the short eight-round season set to start in less than three weeks, the need to find common ground for synergy onfield quickly is paramount.
Gold Coast’s top draft pick Serene Watson said the camp, led by Leah Kaslar, Sally Riley and Lauren Ahrens, turned strangers into friends with 26 of the 30 player-squad attending.
“We had an off-season trip organised by the players just to get to know each other as we are a new club and we wanted to learn to bond as a team more,” Watson said.
“It was really good. We hung around and surfed a bit. Even though the weather wasn’t too good, it was lots of fun with the girls down there.
“A lot for the teams have already bonded (for years) so we had to find our own way. ”
Gold Coast women’s football manager Fiona McLarty was impressed by the initiative shown by the playing group, only voicing her concerns about the players cliff jumping into water.
NEW Coomera coach Trent Gregson has revealed off-field politics were behind his surprise Southport exit but the title-winning mentor says he has found a “fresh start” with the Brisbane Women’s Premier League’s emerging force.
After three years as Southport coach, including a 2017 double in the now-defunct
Gold Coast Women’s Premier League, Gregson last month agreed to guide local rivals Coomera in the 2020 BWPL.
He had planned to take a 12-month break but will now head to Viney Park as the replacement for Archy Kahondo, who steered the Colts to an unexpected finals start in their debut BWPL campaign.
Having overseen a Warriors outfit that finished eighth,
Gregson will be joined at Coomera by wife Lisa – a Southport player of 12 years – and he hopes others will jump at the chance to be part of a Colts side on the rise.
“I got contacted by Coomera, took a meeting and was pretty blown out by what they’re doing,” Gregson said.
While Gregson conceded it was difficult to bid farewell to the Warriors, he said his
Coomera challenge had given him a new lease on life.
“To decide to have the season off, it was (hard). Part of me was upset that we couldn’t complete what we sought out to build at Southport,” he said.
“There was some politics I wasn’t real happy with at Southport and that was what made me want to have the year off and not be involved in that political thing anymore.”