There will certainly be some nerves but also a lot of excitement around a proud and historical day for the club when our Gold Coast Airport Seagulls women’s team runs out for our first match against Easts Tigers on Saturday evening.

And it will be a proud moment for all of us involved considering where we have come from in a short period of time. This is a club with a lot of history going back over a century and to now be part of the first Seagulls team in the South-East Queensland competition, in the area of the game that is growing massively.

The club issued an “expression of interest” alert only last December and we had a lot of girls come and go before we started to build numbers and settle on a core squad from the end of January.

We have been shaping as well as could be expected and I’m really excited to see such fresh talent and players from different backgrounds come together for the first time in a competition match. I’m certainly excited to see them start their rugby league journey at an elite level.

We have put together a good core of players, some with experience at this level, some who have played rugby league at a local level and some girls from the ‘sister’ sports of league tag and touch football.

We have Josina Singapu who has been part of the Burleigh Bears team that has dominated the competition by winning the last four premierships. Josina will play lock while another former Burleigh player, Shelley Fox, will play in the front row.

We have Canecia (CJ) Sims who will also play in the front row and has been a very good influence around the group. CJ had been playing American football and represented Australia at the World Cup before switching to league last year with Ipswich Brothers. Of course, she has some pretty good league pedigree being the sister of NRL-experienced players Ashton, Tariq and Korbin Sims and former Jillaroos representative Ruan.

Chantelle Schofield, a centre, joins us from Auckland where she has been playing for the Mt Albert club and has plenty of experience. Chantelle has played for the Auckland representative team and Cook Islands.

Serena Martin also has league experience having played for Mudgeeraba. Most others are ‘converts’ but with plenty of ability and quite a bit of youth.

Tarryn Aitken has played for Australia in touch football, and at 19, is an exciting prospect.

Then we have five-eighth Chloe Saddler, whose grandfather Ron played for Australia and was the first indigenous captain of the NSW team in rugby league. Chloe is also still a teenager and one of three Northern NSW girls who have come across from league tag – with Abbie Beecher and Lizzy Ross from Ballina.

Other local young prospects are fullback Olivia Attenborough-Doyle who just turned 20 and centre Zara Canfield who just turned 18.

It’s a great positive for us too that we have been able to recruit the Australian Jillaroos and Brisbane Broncos WNRL physio Carly Jenner and Jo Parsonage, Surfing Australia and former Welsh rugby union strength and conditioning coach. That shows the confidence they have in what we are trying to achieve here.

The other teams would have prepared well also and have more experience,  but I’m confident in our players’ abilities to compete hard every week whilst playing an exciting brand of footy. There is no doubting all the players that take the field in the black and white will be doing their part to help the team. Obviously winning would be great, but the staff and myself want to keep educating the girls about footy at this level and see them improve individually on their rugby league journey.

There are so many opportunities for women in rugby league now with better pathways, stronger competition and an increase in exposure and popularity. It would be wonderful to see some of our girls come through our program and achieve higher honours.

I really appreciate how the Tweed Seagulls Club and Gold Coast Airport have welcomed and supported me.

We have created a real family culture in this women’s team. Their work ethic and dedication to training has been outstanding  and I’m genuinely proud and excited for them for the upcoming weekend.

Hopefully the people of the Tweed district will be proud of them too and come to support the team often at Piggabeen.

Kelvin Wright

Gold Coast Airport Seagulls women’s team coach