Pre-season form gives belligerent Bulls hope

Broome Bulls president Tony Hart is cautiously confident long-suffering fans of the team will have something to cheer about this year after a promising performance at the West Kimberley Football Association Lightning Carnival two weeks ago.

“The club is nearing the end of our two or three-year plan,” Hart said.

“We’ve addressed a lot of the issues we’ve faced over the last couple of years – one of those was recruiting.

“We obviously finished on the bottom of the ladder last year but we’ve recruited very well.

“We’ve had six boys from Victoria join the team for this season.”

Hart said the Victorian players got a rude shock playing in the heat at the carnival but he was confident they could adapt.

In something of a coup, the Bulls have managed to snare Tim Richter, 2009 Kevin Bullen medallist, who had played for Towns during his last stay in Broome. The Kevin Bullen medal is awarded to the league’s best and fairest player.

Hart said while Richter hadn’t played a game for the Bulls yet, he was pleased to have the midfielder joining the team.

Peninsula Bombers coach Robert Wilson was surprised to see his team win its third pre-season flag in a row after a slow start to the year.

He said the club’s pre-season had been slow, with not many players showing up to training, but in the couple of weeks before the carnival players had “come out of the woodwork”.

“Every season I use the lightning carnival as a bonding session for the team,” he said.

“I’m glad to see the vast majority of the players from last season have stuck around and we’ve also had four or five new, younger players come into the side.

“We’re aiming for the flag again but it might be a bit harder because the other teams look like they’ve improved a lot.”

After overcoming several significant setbacks in the pre-season, the Saints performance at the lightning carnival would have soothed nerves at the club. President Dave Pigram was pretty happy with the performance.

The appointment of a caretaker coach, with a permanent coach to be announced in the very-near future, will help the club recover from the loss of premiership coach Neil Bourke and several senior players.

Mr Pigram said the team had a slower start to the season than in previous years but was supremely confident they would be prepared for the first round of league competition this weekend.

“We lost a few players to competitions down south but we’re getting ready for the season,” he said.

“We had some good signs from the lightning carnival. We won a couple and lost a couple of close games.”

Carnival runners-up Towns have taken valuable experience from the pre-season cup despite losing the grand final to the Peninsula Bombers.

Coach Brett Hughes was happy with his team’s performance after the Falcons went undefeated into the grand final.

“I think we only won three games last year so to get that winning feeling early on in the season is good for the team,” he said.

“I’m very happy with how the boys performed in the carnival.

“The pre-season carnival gives a fair idea of how the season is going to go, who are going to be the strong teams, but I think a lot of the teams were missing a few players, so it’s hard to tell for sure.”

Mr Hughes said the team had added around 30 players to its pool of talent and, with the addition of a reserves side, would be hoping to give as many players as possible a run.

“I think the reserves comp is going to be really good for the league, it’ll keep those players who might not have got a game every week in the league,” he said.

“Some players can get a bit disheartened when they show up to training each week and miss out on a game for whatever reason. “The reserves should solve that problem, I hope.”

Cable Beach president Mick Albert is hoping an injection of young blood into his team’s playing group will fill out the club’s reserves team and bolster the ranks of the league side.

He said he wasn’t happy with how the team performed at the beginning of the carnival, however, by the end of the competition, the group was beginning to gel as a team.

“We were missing a few of our senior players, we weren’t at 100 per cent and won’t be by round 1,” he said. “We’ve had a huge injection of young people joining the team coming up from the juniors and we will be able to field a full reserves side.

“Jackson Leach and Stephen Brockhurst are young guys who are potentially stars in the making.”