GROUP 20 club Darlington Point-Coleambally Roosters have moved swiftly to replace Ryan McGoldrick.
DPC has announced the signing of former Leeton and Temora player Clinton Green as captain-coach for the 2016 Group 20 rugby league season with Joshua Veivers named Green’s assistant.
Green joins the Roosters after one year stints with Group Nine club Temora and Farrer League club Coleambally.
Before that he spent over 10 years with the Leeton Greens.
The lure of coaching his first senior side was too good to pass.
“It was a bit of a surprise when DPC asked me but I thought it was a good opportunity,” Green said.
“I’m 30 now so it [a coaching opportunity] mightn't come again and I jumped at it.”
DPC have also been bolstered by two other signings.
Ben Tupou has joined the club from Group 4 team Narrabri and Andrew Herbert has come out of retirement to play seniors as well as coach the under 18s.
Herbert is a former coach of the club while Tupou scored nine tries in eight games for Narrabri this year and has the ability to play second row and centre.
The new signings – combined with DPC’s strong junior base has president Steve Hogan excited about the club’s future.
“We have some really good under 18s players from last year. Blake Carroll, Tom Young, Luke and Tom hogan, Craig Matereke, Lukas Brain and a few others are coming up and keen,” Hogan said.
The juniors have consistently made the finals in the past couple of years with the 2014 under 16s taking out the premiership.
Ensuring the juniors can make a smooth transition into senior football will be a focus.
“DPC have a lot of real good juniors. There’s some 18, 19, 20 year olds with a lot of talent,” Green said.
“[I’m looking forward to] working with those younger fellas. I can see a few getting a run in the first grade side next year.”
Green is still employed in Leeton and will make the trek to training and matches from there.
He had a meet and greet with the players on Tuesday night and Green was pleased by the turnout.
“We had about 25 seniors show up, you couldn't ask for much more than that before Christmas,” Green said.
