RISE carnivals kick off across Queensland

Queensland’s next generation of representative players will put their best foot forward at this week’s RISE Rugby League Development program carnivals.

Queensland Rugby League’s Northern region wrapped up their carnivals on Thursday, September 22, after four days of action for teams from Mackay, Townsville, Mt Isa and Far North Queensland.

South East and Central meanwhile will kickstart their carnivals over the coming days, with sides converging at Redcliffe, Helensvale and Toowoomba across the weekend.

Gladstone will then host the final Central carnival next month.

With the RISE program having launched across May and June, these carnivals are a culmination of all the hard work participants have put in and not only do they give them an opportunity to display their new skills, but also the confidence they have developed over the past few months.

Chris Little, a RISE head coach and Redcliffe’s Cyril Connell Challenge head coach, said while he personally wasn’t using the carnivals as an opportunity to identify talent, he knew other coaches would be.

For Little, the most important progress he wanted to see this weekend - with Redcliffe’s carnival held across Friday and Saturday - is a better understanding of skills and belief in ability.

“We’ve purposely evenly matched our sides so that a Division 3 kid gets an opportunity to play with a Division 1 kid, and they get the same coaching, same messaging, same training,” he said.

“We just want them to go out there and have as much fun as they possibly can. I’m using the carnival to make sure every player gets an opportunity and walks away from this program a better footy player.

“They’ll walk away better on and the off the field.

“A lot of them came to us very shy and hesitant and not confident. But then when we finished our last 15s training session the other day, you could see the confidence and the understanding that there’s a lot of help and assistance out there for them.

“Particularly with the 15s age group, it’s giving kids the confidence to come down and trial (for Cyril Connell) next year.

“In the past they wouldn’t have had that confidence to come down.”

Little was particularly impressed with how the RISE program had strengthened Redcliffe’s affiliate relationships with clubs such as Dayboro, Narangba, Deception Bay, Albany Creek and Burpengary.

He said not only has it united the affiliates with one another, but he is hopeful he will now see kids from these clubs push themselves to make their way into the QRL’s pathways, such as trialling for Redcliffe’s under 16s Cyril Connell Challenge team.

Meanwhile, the female participants at this year’s RISE carnivals will also be looking to put their name forward for further development opportunities, such as the annual Queensland City v Country representative clash, the Harvey Norman Under 19 competition and the Future Maroons Academy.

Rebecca Peterson, a RISE North coach and the Queensland Under 17 Country Girls assistant coach, said there will be people watching the carnivals and the development of the female participants into the future.