Barbarian, give us the insights into KOBS from here.
I'm not involved on the committee any more, so don't have first-hand knowledge.
But the writing has been on the wall for a while. Ever since our 1st grade won the Barraclough Cup in 2010, and then 14 of the 15 players retired, things have been going downhill.
We've struggled to have any success in the top grades, with only a handful of wins in 1s and 2s over the past 3 years. That erodes your top level talent (who don't want to lose all the time) and then compounds the damage as 2nd and 3rd graders are forced higher to cover, and then lose even more.
Our success was in the lower grades, with a group of guys who have been together for around 10 years and wanted to play together (I have played with these guys for the past three years). After being there or thereabouts for five years without success, we made a big push last year, training hard chasing a title.
We managed to win 4ths (just!), and like 2010 about 75% of the team hung up the boots there and then.
So then the club lost all it had going for it- a good bunch of veterans in the lower grades.
Efforts at recruitment have been unsuccessful. Training in Glebe and playing at the school in Parramatta means you don't really have any 'home turf', and getting Kings boys to come and play is far harder than you would all think.
Now it's pretty much rock bottom, and who wants to come and play for a team that lose by 50 each week? I have been working weekends and unable to play, but frankly I am not sure I want to now. I'm a genuine 3rd grader, but the way things are now I'm up in 2s and subbing for 1s, which I really don't want.
I've got no idea what was said to Subbies, though I was told the club was up front with the issues faced at the start of the season.
It just seems like the system now will continue to punish KOBs for it's lack of top-level talent, and kill the club. We need to be able to drop 1s, and field a 2s and 3s side only, as the way things are now helps no-one, not even the teams winning by 80.
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