Well if Kings which is an old boy club for a school can't get colts then what chance do clubs like Hawkesbury have when they are no affiliated to a school have?
I understand that subbies have seen colts as the lifeblood of clubs which is true but some clubs will struggle to field colts teams.
We've struggled for Colts at Kings for a few reasons:
1. Lack of awareness from students - when you're in year 12, you barely know what you are doing next week, let alone next year. They aren't exposed to subbies, and there is so much uncertainty about their future that they haven't given one iota of thought to their sport next year, unless they playing rep footy. They simply don't know KOBs exists.
The roll-on from that is they don't realise the standard of footy involved. The guys we really want at that level are the 3rds, 4ths, and 5ths players, but they all think 'well I'm not good enough for Eastwood, so I guess no rugby for me'.
2. Location issues - Kings is a weird school (I didn't go FYI), with students locally, from around town and a heap of borders from the country. After they leave school they head in a million directions. We train in town, play at Parramatta (which is a whole other issue). Often these guys don't have the means to make one of those two locations (these guys aren't Eastern Suburbs rich kids, by and large).
3. Lack of influencers. You just have to get lucky with Colts. Sometimes you get a guy down that can bring six mates. And you need four or five of those guys to create a good team. Our colts were good for a few years back around 07-09 because we had a few guys in the Sydney Uni Colleges who were great at roping in mates and others to come and play, and a few of them turned out to be gun players (how I came to the club, though am certainly not a gun player!). But then they left college, and we lost the link and have been struggling to rebuild it ever since, but it's hard.
4. Lack of committed coaches. Coaching Colts is a pain. You need to spend hours each week chasing them up, getting them to training, to the game, organising lifts, picking them up yourself. We had an old bloke who loved doing this, but he moved on and we just couldn't find someone willing to commit the hours. Or find guys that were keen but would crack the shits halfway through the season, when he had locked in 19 players but only 13 would turn up.
.......And all those considered, I reckon we have it waaay easier than some other clubs when it comes to Colts!!
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