February 2, 2014
The Kingaroy senior soccer clubrooms were packed for a special meeting held on Friday night to meet recently elected Football South West Queensland Zone president Nigel Fanning.
Mr Fanning was successful when he stood against long-serving president Allan Sothmann last November.
He has more than 30 years experience working in Australia and the United Kingdom, and is currently an adviser at the Department of National Parks, Recreation Sport & Racing, as well as an active Reserve Officer (Major) in the Australian Defence Force.
He is now responsible for the 3907 junior players, 690 senior players, nine associations and 24 clubs in the SWQ Zone.
Mr Fanning was accompanied on his visit by Anthony Bigby, chairman of the SWQ Thunder, the football club set up 18 months ago to compete in the National Premier League (NPL) competition and provide an “elite pathway” opportunity for zone players across different age levels.
Mr Bigby said the Thunder was like any other football club, except it had no home ground, no clubhouse and no supporter base. Despite this, the U20s made the grand final and more than half of the club’s junior teams finished in the top four, ie would have made it into the finals if finals had been played.
For the 2014 season, the Thunder was one of only four clubs in the NPL who nominated a team in all age groups, in both boys and girls divisions, but disappointingly there would now be no U17 women’s NPL competition because not enough teams had been nominated by other clubs.
Mr Bigby said attempts were being made to organise a competition for these players.
The South West Queensland Zone is one of 10 zones that make up the Football Queensland structure.
