Central Scorpions Touch Association

Central Scorpions Touch Association are happy to announce their selection trials for Winter 2004 season.

Come and try out for your local regional team, and play at the next level. Everyone is welcome!

Central Scorpions Touch Association is a member of the TouchSA State League competition, and provides an opportunity for City Touch Club members to play at a representative level in one of the following divisions:

Men's Open

Women's Open

Mixed Open

Mixed Junior (18 and under)

The competition will run on Friday Nights, with a couple of Sunday Afternoon games, and will be held at Park 17 (The City Touch Fields).
Games start at 6:15 pm, and round 1 is on August 6th.

To be eligible to play State League, you must have (or will, by the first game) played 4 games at City Touch, in any competition.

Trial Details:

• Location: Park 17, Greenhill Road
  City Touch Fields
  
• Date: 11th July, 2004
  
• Time: 12:00 noon - 3:30pm
  
  
• There will be a complimentary BBQ following the trials, at which time Central Scorpions Touch Association will hold it's AGM.
  All participants are invited to attend the AGM.
  

To enable us to plan for the day, please submit the following information to Ron Kerr:

• Name:
  
• Address:
  
• Phone Number:
  
• Email Address:
  
• Date Of Birth:
  
• City Touch Team:
  

Players will all trial together, and will be allocated to a team upon successful selection. If you have a preference for a particular team (eg, Junior or Mixed Open), please include this in the email.

posted by Anonymous @ 5:39 pm 0 comments

Or Scorps Have Biggest Win Yet.

Well, 14 - 0 is okay I suppose! Seriously, a great result, befitting a great game. We welcomed Holly to the team in a big way. With Donna running from half more times a game than I do now, and Lara & Wina killing the defence with switches, AUTC had no idea of what was coming. Our driving game gave us the momentum to get over the line literally dozens of times, and our tight defence kept them inside their ten for most of the game.

Twelve players works really well with our current style of game, and hopefully we will have that many each week. We now have 13 on the team list, but that just means if anyone is away we will still be okay, and it will reduce the per-player cost.

Which, incidentally, is $75 for 13 players. Plus the $35 each for the tops, should make a total of $110. I'll refund the $35 to people who don't want to keep the tops, when they return them to me at the end of the season. I intend for this team to continue playing in City Touch, and we'll keep using the same tops each season. I'm more than happy for all of you to keep playing, season after season, if you want to. So think of the top payment as an investment! Great to say that we only owe $390 to City Touch for this season now!

One girl made a comment tonight that she is concerned about not making the Scorps Women's team. I do want to make the point that there will be selections for that team (well, if I am coach, I will hold selections - appointments haven't been made yet!), but all of the players in this team should be confident. And I will point out that there will be a junior team, and since the age limit on that is 18, there aren't too many who would be eligible for juniors if they don't get selected into the opens. Or some of you may find yourself playing Mixed Open.

I would be happy to have just the girls in this team as the Scorps Women's Open, but I do need to hold selections - it is not fair to the girls playing at City Touch who aren't in our team but still want to play State League.

Well, that's it for this week. 7:05 next week, against a junior (even more so than Nicole/Alyce/etc) WDTA team. Those of you who didn't pay the $50 this week need to do so ASAP, and then the other money whenever you can. I won't give out tops to girls who are 'unfinancial', not that the tops have even been designed yet.

Central Scorpions Touch Association, the State League region based at City Touch Club, is calling for nominations to coach teams in the following divisions:

Men's Open

Women's Open

Mixed Open

Mixed Junior

The competition will run on Friday nights from August 6th, at the City Touch fields.
Coaches are expected to either be ATA Accredited coaches or intend to become qualified at the next opportunity.

Interested parties are asked to please send an email to Ron Kerr with the following:

Contact Details

Coaching Qualifications

Experience

Please include the names of up to two people able to verify your coaching ability.

Nominations close on Tuesday, June 22nd.

Nominees will be contacted regarding appointments or otherwise by Friday, June 25th.

posted by Anonymous @ 10:57 pm 0 comments

I won't go into too much detail as to what happened at the meeting last night - those who really need the minutes should have received them in the email.

For other interested parties: read on.

• We have put out a call for coaches through Gavin from City Touch. I'll put another notice up here about that as well. Not that anyone but Brice, Lindy have actually looked at this site.
  
  
• There is a Level 1 Coaching Course being run by TouchSA on July 25th. Anyone wishing to be a State League coach must show some intent to do this course. At some stage in the future. Like I intended to score 8 touchdowns last night.
  
  
• There will be an email about Trials for State League, after the coaches have been selected. (Did I mention we are looking for coaches...?) The Trials themselves will be in early July. On a weekend, as the City Touch fields are out-of-bounds after sunset.
  
  
• The AGM will be held on this day too. I just want to point out that we really need some keen people on the committee - without a couple more interested people Brice, Matt MS, Ron and I are likely to go insane.
  
  
• Dates of importance:
  
  • State League Begins: August 6th.
    
  • Border Challenge: 28th-29th August.
    
  • Aussie Cup: 7th-9th October (To Be Confirmed).
    
  • No Winter Carnival.
    
  • Updates here as new dates decided.
    
  
  
• We would really like to get some fundraising happening: if we can get the money from other sources you guys won't have to pay as much to play! A fundraising committee will be created after the AGM.
  
  
• Same deal for Social Events - some of the other regions have semi-regular social gatherings, it would be nice to get a bit more of a club atmosphere happening. Maybe we should host a blue-light disco, since most of our players are under 18!
  
  
• We also discussed referees - each region is required to supply a certain number of referees for the State League. Generally they should be Level 2 or above, although, if the intent to do a Level 2 course is there...
  
  
• I am also going to get organised about uniforms - Gavin has a supplier that can do uniforms of the style that the participants of the Elite Camp got for "no more than $30", including numbers and a Scorps logo. I'll organise a set of these for the City Scorps Women, and probably another for the Junior Mixed, since they can play State League in non-Wilma tops this season. I'm open to other suggestions (and interested in ideas about colours).
  

Thanks for your time.

The draw is out for the rest of the season:

Note that Red Roosters were called Panthers Pacemakers.

1	24/05/04 (Mon)	19:55	Field 1	WDTA Fruittis
2	31/05/04 (Mon)	20:45	Field 4	WDTA 1(Wom)
3	07/06/04 (Mon)	20:45	Field 1	Gregan's Grogan's 1
4	21/06/04 (Mon)	19:55	Field 2	AUTC Aphrodite
5	28/06/04 (Mon)	19:05	Field 2	WDTA Mcleod's Daughters
6	05/07/04 (Mon)	19:55	Field 1	Pigs can Fly
7	12/07/04 (Mon)	18:15	Field 2	Red Roosters
8	19/07/04 (Mon)	19:05	Field 4	WDTA Fruittis
9	26/07/04 (Mon)	20:45	Field 1	WDTA 1(Wom)
10	02/08/04 (Mon)	18:05	Field 3	Gregan's Grogan's 1
11	09/08/04 (Mon)	19:05	Field 1	AUTC Aphrodite
12	16/08/04 (Mon)	19:05	Field 1	WDTA Mcleod's Daughters

Scorps win again!

A change again from last week meant that we once again played the game with only seven players. With the Sacred Heart girls studying for exams (apparently Lara has exams too, but she is totally committed - or doesn't need to study - one of the two!), we played against what looks to be the other power team in the competition, Greegan's Grogans.

The game started with us managing (off some good rucking) to break through and score a quick touchdown, but Nicole T managed to sweep around our winger and score one back. Lindy scored another one with a quick dodge, and just before half time, Amy broke through the defensive line and raced home to score our third. 3-1 up at half time. A rousing speech by the super-coach (that's me!) at half time, and the girls came out firing in the second half. Two touchdowns came from Amy and Mel D doing Amy's Favourite Move, a K2. Final score: 6 - 2. (Which way, Amy?)

Lots of good stuff again to take from this game - no-one shirked the responsibility of being out there for a significant period of the game. When everything settles down and we can get into some positional rotations the quality of our on-field game will improve: at the moment we are often too tired to hit the holes as hard as we should. (Makes me recall the Grand Final drop-off last season, where we drove to the box, subbed all three players and ran across to the opposite corner of the field and scored a beautiful touchdown. Bought a tear to my glass eye. Perfect example of how fresh legs can create an amazing attack in seconds.)

Things I'd like to see us improve:

• We still aren't getting to a half when we drive. We did it a bit more last week (more subs, I suppose), but often the nearest player is 7 or 8 metres away from the roll-ball. Getting that player to the roll-ball, or the roll-ball to a player means that we can have the next driver running with the ball before the defenders get onside.
  
• Our middle-middle defense still is a bit loose. The outside (long-side : away from the ball) middle needs to follow the short-side middle across. Just because the ball has moved off your side of the field, your job isn't done. You need to be there to cover a return ball, switch or dump-n-scoop. Obviously, the long-side link and winger also need to cover for the same reasons.
  
• Our error and penalty rate were too high. Once again due to tiredness: although, we did give away heaps of penalties in the first 5 minutes. Maybe we need to get there earlier and warm up a bit first. We can't get over the line and score if we don't have the ball, and giving the opposition a tap and 5 more metres just makes it harder!
  

Don't get me wrong, I think we are a great team. I guess I just think we can do better. I love the fact that we are winning comfortably, but as I said during the half-time break, we need to begin to think about how we are going to play in State League, the Nationals or NTL, or all three.

Back onto the admin side of things - thanks to the girls who paid a bit of money the season fees are $915 all up, and with 12 players (which we might have) this works out to just over $75 each. At this stage, I have about 10 players who I am confident will play (and pay). I will work on a couple of others (including a new name Gavin gave me). I really want us to have 12 - I doubt that we are often going to have everyone every game, but 7 is obviously too few for us to work on much other than fitness. Not that improving our fitness is such a bad thing, eh Alyse?

In terms of shirts, Amy tells me Sportsgirl (or wherever she went) has only crap stuff (her words, not mine). So, I will make contact with a sports clothing supplier or two. Costs will be notified as soon as I find out (check back here to see up-to-date info).

No game next week: Queen's Birthday (Have a good one from us, Lizzie!). The following week, 21st June, we play against the Adelaide Uni team. Times will be announced any day now.

I recently attended the Regional Coordinators meeting, on behalf of Ron, and since a nice summary of the meeting was emailed today, I thought I'd put the relevant stuff up here.

Due to some changes, or rather lack of changes (SA was not granted an NTL permit, and is to remain part of Crusaders), the format of Winter State League is going to change from what was announced earlier this year. Specifically, the requirement of having a tournament for Crusaders selection (the Australia Cup - to be held in Melbourne this year) means that the timeline must change.

The thing that is most obvious is that a carnival held at the end of the competition is something we want to get away from. People tend to be a little Touched-Out, and attendance is not as good as it should be. The winter carnival, which is a great opportunity for our junior teams to play in a real carnival before the National Championships, will go ahead, but probably before the season.

[Edit]: I must have misunderstood this part of the meeting, apparently the Winter Carnival is not going to happen!

The biggest change from last year is the inclusion of a Junior competition - basically the same rules as the summer competition, except players who play Opens (Men or Women) will not be eligible to play Junior (Mixed). This is largely because both competitions will be on at the same time. Age limit is to be 18, as it was over Summer. It is expected that most of the 18s State teams will be playing Opens anyway - this should reduce the mismatches that occurred in size over summer.

Also, it is envisioned that the cost of entering a junior team will be reduced - the problem is that TouchSA isn't making a profit as such out of State League, so there are not many areas to reduce costs. One of the ways to reduce actual costs will be to relax the uniform requirements - junior teams won't have to wear the sanctioned regional uniforms, just a uniform top amongst that team.

Some of you may have been involved in the Mens Open competition this Summer - Wolves entered a second team, and this was just short of a disaster. It reduced the quality of the Mens competition, as well as virtually killing the Mixed competition. There will only be one team per region per competition until further notice.

Since TID has already occurred for the State Open teams (and selections for 18s & 15s - 12s are in just under a fortnight), the requirement of regions to supply TID personnel during State League has been removed. The Coach and Head Selector for each Open team will continue to assess performance of TID'd players, and watch for others that might have slipped through the process. All Open reps must play at State League. I'm not sure if this applies to 18s reps as well - but I will encourage (strongly) all of my 15s girls to play Junior (if not Open) State League.

Finally, whilst dates have not yet been announced, expect the competition to start in early August (my tip is the 6th), and to run on Friday nights, with a couple of Sunday Afternoon games. Keep an ear and eye out for info about Scorpions Trials - we already have some interest from some new up-and-coming juniors!

This is an announcement of the upcoming Central Scorpions management meeting.

Date: 10/6/04 (Thursday, Round 3)
Time: 7:00pm
Location: Park 17 Clubrooms (City Touch)

Agenda:

1. Apologies
   
2. New Committee Members
   
3. Update from Regional Coords Meeting (Matt S)
   
4. Coaching Appointments
   
5. Training of Coaches
   
6. Recruitment
   
7. Winter State League Trials (including advertising)
   
8. Develop Club Timeline with important dates (AGM, Aussie Cup, First State League game, etc)
   
9. Fundraising
   
10. Social Events
    
11. Website (Matt S)
    
12. SMS Auto-service (Matt S)
    
13. Uniforms
    
14. Next Meeting
    

If you would like to attend, and are not on the committee, please contact Ron Kerr on 0413 046 717, or Matt Schinckel on 0422 11 86 11.

Another 8-0 win keeps Scorps Women at the top of the table.

If last week we had too few players, last night we had almost too many! 14 players in total, and whilst that is how many I'd like us to field in State League games, it was probably a couple too many for Park. To everyone's credit, we still got on with the job, and I didn't hear any complaints. Next week we are likely to have 7 players again, so our average is about right!

Our line attack is definitely going to be the thing we begin to focus on over the next few weeks. I'd really like to get everyone there a bit before the game in a couple of weeks (maybe not next week, since the Year 11s are all bust studying for exams!), so we can actually practice a couple of things. I'm sure most of us know what we need to do, but we need to rehearse it until it becomes second nature. Maybe even first nature!

Lots of positives from last nights game - I really like how confident Em, Lucy A and Wina are when they go out to do bananas on the wing. Perhaps that is something we can work on getting the rest of the team to learn? I also love it when Alyse turns on her speed and chases hard! And a big thankyou to Mallory for playing - I'm sure she won't have as quite as much fun with the team she is moving to!

Speaking of players leaving, it's a real shame to (temporarily - I certainly hope to see them back for State League!) lose Tessa and Lucy B. Last week it was Lucy making a full field run to score a Touchdown - this week it was Tessa doing the same to save one! They were a great addition to our team, even if they showed up in ugg boots.

Next week might be a different kettle of fish - Gregan's Grogans have some quality players (Claire H, Nicole T, and others too), and we really need to be switched on. They are the only other team to have won both games, and have only had 1 touchdown scored against them. If a team is going to challenge us (let alone our clean sheet!), it could be them.

Amy is going to look into some cheap tops from Sportsgirl, or somewhere like that, and report back to the rest of us next week. I'd also like to get an initial payment of $50. I did a couple of sums today on costs, and (assuming we have 12 players) it works out to just less than $80 per player.

Next week: 8:45 pm, Field 1 vs. Gregan's Grogans 1.