Family bonds fuelling charge
WHEN one teammate is hurting, the entire Cyclones squad feels that pain.
As linebacker Jimmi Thompson’s father battled a health scare, it galvanised the players and has them determined to once again lift the Reef Bowl trophy.
Thompson’s dad Craig, known affectionately as Uncle Chopper for his handlebar moustache, had a heart attack earlier in the year.
Thompson said his dad was surprising even his doctors with how he had recovered from open heart surgery last month, and now the squad had even greater motivation to reclaim the North Queensland Gridiron League silverware.
He said when it came to the Cyclones he was not Craig’s only child; the whole team had leaned on him at some point throughout the club’s lifespan.
“It was pretty bad but he’s recovering extremely well,” Thompson said. “He’s up and about and goes for little drives to the shops and he’s feeling a lot healthier than when he had that problem.
“I let the boys know straight away and they said whatever you need from us to help give us a shout.
“It’s the little things he does the boys appreciate the most. Now he’s going through a hard time, the boys have stepped up and helped us and him.
“Even last year during the Reef Bowl it was a bit tough because my dad was going through a bit of a health problem there as well. He was there but we didn’t get to have him on the sidelines or hear from him too much.
“This year there’s a definite effort to get him to the Reef Bowl.”
When Thompson wanted to start playing gridiron, he said his parents were hesitant. But it was a passion which would not go away, and took plenty of begging to be signed up.
The linebacker said that while growing up he played so much weekend sport he was often home from school sick on Mondays. All there was to do was watch the NFL in the mornings.
Now Thompson is a key figure in the Cyclones’ charge back to the top of the podium, a task he said was about to become far more difficult.
Two new outfits, the Mulgrave Vikings and Gladstone Pirates, will enter the fold, and Thompson said it had sparked an even more intense pre-season than they had experienced.
He said with the game growing each year, they had found even greater motivation to stamp their authority.
“It can get a bit monotonous beating teams by 50,” Thompson said. “We’ve got a challenge now, we have to stand up and we have to fight for our position. We won’t back down, we won’t think they are new teams who will be bad. We’ll treat every game like a Reef Bowl this year.”