presentations on Sunday at Tom Knight Memorial Oval: Rowdy Barton (Club Overall Best & Fairest Award); Oisin McMullen (Ted Brown Senior Clubman of the Year Award); and Charlie Nicholson (Tyronne Purcell Junior Clubman of the Year Award ).
Cobar Junior Rugby League held their end of season awards at Tom Knight Memorial Oval on Sunday afternoon.
In addition to various team awards, 11 perpetual club awards were presented.
This year’s Paul Goonrey Player with the Biggest Heart Award was earned by Jarryn Moore.
The award was initiated by the Goonrey Family in memory of Paul, and it honours a junior league player who plays every game with their whole heart, leaving everything they have on the field.
Cobar Junior Rugby League president Genie McMullen praised Jarryn’s attitude to the game.
“This player is a fantastic role model to our smaller statured players, showing that it’s not your size that makes you good at footy, it’s what you do with your footy skills that makes you the best player you can be,” Genie said.
“Jarryn is an awesome team player and defends with his heart.”
Rowdy Barton collected this year’s Club Overall Best and Fairest Award.
Best and fairest points are awarded by the referee each week in every competitive game.
The award is presented to the player who has accumulated the most points in a single age division throughout the season with Rowdy the highest point scorer this year.
Eligh Ritter was this season’s Overall Top Try Scorer.
Tom Good was on hand on Sunday to present his namesake trophy, the Tommy Good Top Tackler Award.
The award is named after the local footy legend who, when he was playing grade footy, won the ‘daisy cutter’ award which was given for tackling hard and mowing down the opposition – cutting down the daisies’.
Tom presented this year’s Top Tackler award to Lachlan Brookman.
The Wayne Buckman Memorial Award honours a former Junior Rooster, Wayne Buckman, who was tragically killed when he was eight years old.
It’s presented to an Under 8 junior Rooster who has had the best and fairest game performance throughout the season and this year it went to Rosie George.
Hudson Simon collected the Mini’s Best and Fairest Player award named in honour of Shad Fisher, who was a huge supporter of mini league.
The Tyronne Purcell Junior Clubman of the Year Award came to life when it was donated by a former senior Roosters player Tyronne Purcell.
Tyronne had received the award in 1985 when playing for the Winton Devils and he donated it to the Cobar Junior Roosters in 2004.
The award is given to a junior league player who contributes back to the club and shows up outside of their game to support the club and their fellow players.
This years’ recipient was Charlie Nicholson who was described as being a very positive team member, polite and respectful and a person who constantly offers to help to do anything needed off the field.
This year’s Ted Brown Senior Clubman of the Year Award was earned by Oisin McMullen.
Named in honour of local junior league champion Ted Brown in recognition of his many years volunteering for Cobar Junior League, the award is given to a Rooster who gives back to the club, who gets involved, helps out and puts in effort.
This season Oisin volunteered his time as a referee on Saturdays and Sundays, he volunteered in club activities, behaved respectfully, was willing to share his wealth of footy rule knowledge and has a positive attitude towards giving back. Oisin is an outstanding role model for the club.
Initiated almost 20 years ago by Mark Smith, his namesake Player with the Most Potential award was a way for Mark to give back to his footy roots.
A Cobar local, Mark started playing footy for the junior Roosters and played through the ranks, going on to be part of premiership winning teams.
Ella Oborn was this year’s recipient of the Mark Smith Player with the Most Potential award.
Ella shows huge potential as a rugby league player having shown outstanding growth as a player this season, and putting enormous energy into her games.
“For someone who has just played their first season of footy ever, it’s so exciting to acknowledge this year’s recipient, a great role model for females in footy, Ella Oborn,” Genie said.
The Rookie of the Year Award was introduced last season by the Executive Committee in recognition of the courage it takes to join a skillful team sport, particularly in an older age group when most team members have been playing for several years already.
“Many young people enjoy watching the sport and may want to be involved but find it too daunting to put themselves out there to learn the skills and develop the physicality needed to play,” Genie said.
“This award has been inspired by those young people who have done so.
“The award nominees are those who have played little to no rugby league prior to joining the team.”
Genie said this year’s recipient, Holly Watt, threw herself into training and worked really hard to improve her footy skills.
She slotted into the team as though she had been there for years.
Genie said Holly’s positive attitude and hard work for the team showed in each game and her improvement over the season is a testament to the hard work she put in.
The President’s award was initiated by Simone Knight/Neyland during her 10 year presidency, to recognise a person who doesn’t fit the criteria for other awards but gave 100 per cent during the season.
Genie said there were two people this season who had gone over and above on many occasions, for the love of footy with Ashley Cousins and Sosie Barton sharing the award this year.
“They both helped out any time they were asked and then volunteered to do more,” she said.
The roles they took on were not minor ones.
They helped to referee, act as linespersons, scorers, helped with game day set up, operated the veo game recording system so players could watch themselves on the big screen, and helped for long hours in the canteen.
Genie said she was
