Rugby league runs in Warren’s blood
ROWAN SPARKES
LIKE the thousands of footy boots that run out on to the fields at Jones Park every year, Warren Pitt has left a mark on the rugby league community in north Queensland.
A keen player in his junior days and a champion of rugby league in his adult life, Pitt has been awarded life membership at almost every rugby league body he’s been associated with in more than 50 years of service as a player, coach, referee and administrator.
His rugby league journey started at the age of 10 in Cairns, where he began playing schoolboy football for Parramatta State School.
During his early teenage years, Pitt travelled all over Queensland with his family, playing junior footy in Mount Isa, Cooroy and Charters Towers, where he played his first seniors game as a 16-year-old.
He went to university in Brisbane to study teaching and, after graduating, was posted to Ingham, where he played Agrade for Ingham Lifesavers and Herbert River.
From Ingham, Pitt was transferred to Yarrabah State School, where he played an important role in promoting rugby league in the community as the school’s footy coach.
He was then transferred to Gordonvale, where he helped found the Southern Suburbs Junior Rugby League Club, while playing for the senior team.
Pitt played grassroots footy for nearly 20 years, before “deciding to give it a miss” when he was 29.
“By that stage, a couple of injuries had caught up with me and I decided to get more into coaching,” he said.
“We had a really good run with the schoolboys in the 40kg, we were North Queensland champions for about 12 years coming out of basically the three schools – Gordonvale, Yarrabah and Hambledon – and we drew players from Eacham.
“We had a really good record because I think the kids just loved playing and because we were such a small community, the team spirit and the commitment were a lot higher than some of those bigger schools and bigger towns.”
It was around this time that Pitt also “found his way” into refereeing.
“The Suburbs seniors asked me to go along to a referee course because every club had to put someone in,” he said.
“I flew through the exam and within 12 months was refereeing A-grade in Cairns.
“I refereed for about 10-15 years and did about six grand finals here, a lot of state league games and a couple of internationals up at PNG.”
After two stints as the State Member for Mulgrave, from 1989-1995 and 1998-2009, Pitt was selected to head the new Jones Park Board of Management in 2012, to oversee the development of the Cairns junior rugby league complex, which had been in financial trouble at the time.
Pitt took the role head-on and helped transform the venue into the modern-day sporting hub that it is now.
He said he wanted to carry on the legacy started by rugby league stalwart Jack Seary, who was president of the Cairns and District Rugby League from 1954-59 and inaugural president of the Cairns and District Junior Rugby League in 1965.
“Jack started it all a long time ago, but when the Jones Park Board of Management took over we really moved things along. We upgraded the floodlighting, made the main building nearly double the size, added concrete paths, grandstands,” he said.
Pitt, who stood down from his role as chairman of the JPBM last year, says he believes the venue has a tough road ahead, in the aftermath of COVID-19.
With a passion for the game that runs deep in his veins, Pitt took the field with the FNQ Cyclones Rugby League Masters team less than two years ago as a 70-year-old.
“The good thing about Masters is that you go away and you meet up with people that you either did national service with, or played football against, or cricket against, or boxed against – whatever it may be. It brings people together socially, with football just an excuse to get together, really,” he said.
He said it was those lifelong connections that had kept him involved in the game for so long. “That’s what grassroots rugby league is all about,” he said.