Welcome to this week’s newsletter!

Thanks to all that came to support the quiz night last night, also a big thanks to Hunter for running the event. 

There were some good laughs and dodgy categories, but fun had by all teams who attended.

It was great to be able to connect club wide, rugby and netball over good kai from Eat Food Truck and some drinks. Can’t beat a burger and beer for $20!

We ran a garage sale with old CFC kit which was a success.  We will be running this again on Saturday during bar opening hours in the afternoon, so make sure you get in for a good deal on rugby jerseys and more.

The Eat Food Truck menu will be again providing awesome kai for our teams and families, with the menu for supporters and bar patrons below. For all our U6-U11 (including RIP), teams, that have their junior club day tomorrow – a reminder that ALL Player of the Day presentations are to be held in the clubrooms, during your scheduled time slots. We will be providing a Eat Food Truck team platter post-match for ALL teams free of charge, so make sure you get your boots off and wash your hands straight after the game and enjoy the opportunity to share some post-match yarns with your fellow club members.

Our only senior home match this weekend is our Premier Women’s Team, and we’d love to be able to cheer them onto the field and show them our support – so get down to the club this weekend and wear your red and black!

BAR OPENING HOURS – Sat 20^th May 11am-late

CFC WEEKLY DRAWS

Official link to the Junior Draws click here

Official link to the Senior Draws click here

RUGBY REPORTS

A big thank you to our resource coaches who came in this week to help with our premier squad.  Daniel Cron and ex RDO Craig Dunlea.

It was great to have Dan Cron down to help the forwards with breakdown and lineouts. Dan has a strong connection to CFC as this was the last rugby club he played for back in 1999 & 2000 when he represented for our colts team. The boys loved having him down following a pattern of giving back to the club, just like his father, Mike. We welcome the Crons back anytime with their expert skills.

Also, to Craig Dunlea, who came back to the club as part of his new role in the community resource coaching team as scrum specialist, it was great to be able to utilize his skills at the club once again.

Ngā mihi to you both and look forward to having you down at the club anytime to share your expert knowledge.

Steph Te-Ohaere Fox

Rugby Development Manager

PREMIER RESERVES’ REPORT

13th May 2023

New Brighton Premier Reserves v CFC Premier Reserves

1pm

Full Time: 26-41

All the effort and teamwork that the Premier Reserves have been working on up to this point culminated in the best game of the season against New Brighton. We knew it would be physical, and with a home crowd on club day, New Brighton would be looking to bring it from the moment the whistle blew. The question on the coach's mind, however, how would the Crocs respond? The answer: well. Very well. 
 
The physicality was matched, the team worked together to ignore the off-ball niggle from New Brighton and decided to play our game. Behind the direction of First Five Reuben “Fish” Fisher, the forwards set the pods, we worked to the edge and took the ball past the advantage line almost every phase.  
 
New Brighton, spurred on by a great home crowd, continued to attack through their very capable back three and sizable forward pack. Luckily for the Crocs, Tom Lynn decided to make sure every tackle he made, and there were a lot of them, New Brighton would be feeling the following days. Special mention to one of the most improved players of the 2023 season so far, Andrew “Squirts” Scally who is in the form of his life.  
 
For The Crocs this is a performance that hopefully signposts a positive change in mindset, effort and results.  

Player of the Day: Fish 
Defender of the Day: Tom Lynn 

Connor Kitto

Co-Manager, Premier Reserves

DIV 3 CHOPPERS’ REPORT

13th May 2023

Burnside RFC Cliffords v CFC Choppers

2:45pm

Full Time: 43-7

This week saw us up against a team that started the season in Div 2, the Burnside Cliffords.  A bit of a struggle when you’re up against that level of competition in our grade, but that is just the way it is.

We were missing some of our regular starters through injury and family commitments and that did make a telling difference for us.

The game started with us receiving the ball and while we made a few good carries early on we seemed to be a bit rushed in possession and forgot to focus on the basics; pushing passes and not taking it in to contact setting up for the next play.  Our pod set up was also a bit off on the day, standing far too wide at the breakdown.  Burnside being a well drilled team got off the mark with a backline move, one of many on the day.

The lineout was a bit of a let down again this week and didn’t help with relieving the pressure we were faced with for majority of the first half.  Most of the play was on the left-hand side of the field which happened to be where the Burnside supporters were camped.  They weren’t shy letting me know just how rubbish my lineout throwing was, which helped immensely.  But I managed to pull it back later in the first half and the second half it seemed to come right again.

Burnside ran in a few tries in the first half, and we were doing our best with a scrambled defence trying to keep them out, while they were spreading the ball left and right with ease.  Thanks to some really good last gasp defence, namely Shady and Spitty, we managed to keep the score in check and from completely blowing out.  We were unable to register any first half points.

The first half whistle couldn’t come soon enough and in our huddle at half time there were a lot of dejected faces. Tough job on the coaching staff to pump us up and get ready for the second half.

Off we go for the second half and, having nothing to lose, we actually managed to run the Cliffords around and get them taking a few deep breaths.  Our support play for the runner was impressive and our pods tightened up.  A far more open game second half but with us controlling the pace when on the ball and making sure to look after it in possession.  We eventually crossed the line and all of a sudden had a bit of a bounce in our stride, saving the whitewash.  Small victories in games like this is all you can really clutch to.

The second half score was 14-7 to the Cliffords and the full-time score 43-7.  The final whistle blew and we cracked a well-deserved beer, forgot about the game and have put focus on our next match against the Battlers.

Everyone is allowed to have an off day at the office and the team believe that this game was one of those where we all struggled, collectively.  Having won 3 of the first 4 we now suffer our second defeat of the season. 

A weekend highlight for the Choppers had to be the Div 2 (name escapes me right now) proposal during speeches, really cool to have shared that with you mate and we’re all relieved she said yes!

Cheers,

Jez

Jerard Cowburn

JUNIOR CORNER

How good to see some of last week's Player of The Day recipients, who took the time to send in their pictures from their games! Great job everyone!

Please keep sending your pictures into us - we'll do our best to get a good selection added to the newsletter each week - but we need our teams to send in their game day highlights so we can make this happen!

U9 Sharks POD - George

U8 Foxes  POD - Cameron & Timmy

U7 Bears POD - Ollie & Bear of the Day Elizabeth (not in this picture)

JUNIOR CLUB DAY THIS SATURDAY - U6-U11 (including RIP Teams) !

We're so excited to celebrate our U6-U11 teams this Saturday at our club.

There will be plenty going on with coffee cart and amazing food in at the bar, provided by Eat Food Truck!

All junior teams will head into the club rooms after their games to present their player of the day and share food between their teams. The club will be providing a free hot platter for the players on each team, to include lots of yummy hot treats – perfect for warming cold fingers and toes after the game! These will be served straight after your allotted Player of the Day celebrations.

Please ensure you do head to the club rooms after your games – not many clubs offer a free feed to their teams after the games, so please make the most of the opportunity and take the time to connect with your fellow club families.

The times for each team’s player of the day celebrations in the clubrooms for the day are as follows:

10:30am

U6 Jenkins

U6 Jordan

U6 Christie

U6 McLeod

U6 Gualter Wild Cats

U6 Mighty Pups

10:45am

U7 Bears

U7 Cobras

U7 Tigers

U7 Cougars

U7 Bees

U7 T-Rexs

11:00am

U8 Foxes

U8 Jaguars

U8 Gorillas

U9 Lions

U9 Eagles

11:30am

U9 Sharks

U9 Dragons

U10 Hobbs

U10 Black

U11 Weka

Rip Red Dragons

Rip Black Dragons

12:30pm

U9 Panthers

U11 Kea

U11 Kiwi

Rip White Dragon

See you there!

Volunteer Recognition:

Alex with her beautiful family

This week, we’d like to make a special mention to Alexander Murdoch, Mum of wee Jax, who plays in the U8 Gorillas. Alex is one of our awesome volunteers, who helps manage the team and generally can be relied on to lend a helping hand when needed. We were delighted (but certainly not surprised) to learn that Alexander was the “awesome lady” referred to in the below email, we received from the U8 St Andrew’s team Mum on Monday morning:

“Hi there,

I don't know if this is even the right place to email but I thought I'd shout it out there anyway, because it made me so impressed with your club. 

My daughter plays for St Andrews College Under 8s, and they played against the Christchurch Football Club today. My kid took two big tackles where she hit the deck hard - your kids play a good game! She came off the field twice in tears but got back out there. 

One of your supporters, a woman, came over and encouraged her the second time she came off, and at the end of the game came over and praised how brave and resilient she was, giving her a small bag of M&Ms.

I don't know who this woman was, but I just wanted to let you know that her sportswomanship and encouragement meant the world to us. It was only my daughter's second game, and she's a big, tall girl trying to find her place in the sport. To have another person - from the opposing team - encouraging her was awesome. 

What an excellent club you have, that woman is a legend. I said thanks at the time, but she's really made a difference - she probably won't even realise how much! My daughter is now amped about how tough she is and is looking forward to her next game :) 

Cheers 

Laura “

Thanks, Alexander, for caring for our tamariki and taking the time out to look after all of the players on the field – we are so lucky to have you as part of our club!!

CFC Junior 2023 Chocolate Fundraiser

Thanks to everyone that has so far sold their chocolate and handed in their money.

Just a reminder that ALL money from chocolate sales needs to be handed in the Wednesday, 24^th May. We REALLY appreciate all of your support to help raise funds for our juniors!

GILBERT APPAREL – ONLINE STORE NOW OPEN!

We have a great range to order from with something for everyone from kids to adults’ sizes. More junior socks are on their way and should be available behind the bar again shortly as currently only size 8-11 are available.

We will be running a shop at the club during junior club day next weekend for a selected range of CFC Gilbert branded gear.

Our online store can be accessed here

Article added: Friday 19 May 2023