Sport
4 May, 2023
Success for Snakes at Emerald
Two Caboolture Snakes players and a trainer were part of the Sunshine Coast Falcons women’s rugby league team which took out the 47th Battalion trophy in Emerald last weekend.
Jazmin Migala and Tamzin Taumafai played in each game for the Falcons women while Zeke Field was a trainer, and the Snakes would have had another representative had injury not intervened for Taleah Molloy.
Caboolture was also represented in the men’s division, as Aaron Nelson and Tyler McGoldrick took to the field.
The Falcons team featuring Nelson and McGoldrick beat the Burnett Brahmans 28-10, before going down 20-10 to the Toowoomba Clydesdales last Saturday.
Sunshine Coast edged out the Bundaberg Bears 24-22 the following day, but it wasn’t quite enough for the Falcons to reach the trophy final.
In the men’s decider, Toowoomba overcame a 10-0 half-time deficit to beat the Rockhampton Rustlers 24-10.
The Falcons women’s team meanwhile beat Toowoomba 18-12 and followed up with a more convincing 24-4 victory against the Gladstone Raidettes on day one.
In the following day’s decider, the team featuring Migala and Taumafai trailed 12-10 before coming home strongly and recording a 20-12 win over Rockhampton.
Taumafai said conditions were good and that it was mostly cloudy, and “pretty good weather to play footy in” during the two days.
“A few of the girls mentioned the fields were pretty hard when walking across it, but we never really noticed it when playing,” she said.
Taumafai said something which made the trip enjoyable was “probably just the fact that everyone got along, and the staff and the girls were amazing”.
“I think something that helped lead us to taking the comp out was our coach Steve Belsham,” she said.
“(He) would come around to each player before the game and explain what he would like to see from us.
“He also gave us individual and team goals to work towards. Everyone knew their role before we stepped out on the field.”
Taumafai said most of the Falcons either knew each other or knew of each other, which made it “a lot easier to get things rolling”.
With Taumafai having played in the front-row while Migala was at hooker, the former said they were pretty happy with how they played.
“We were just happy we had the opportunity to be a part of such a great team,” Taumafai said.
Meanwhile, Field’s role could not be understated as the Snakes football operations manager was subsequently announced as a finalist in the QRL 2023 Contribution to the Female Game award and QRL Community Coach of the Year.
Field has taken on numerous coaching and volunteer positions in the past few years.
