State Sports Carnivals held in Bundaberg
It was a wonderful celebration of sport and community as Bundaberg’s Shalom College hosted 48 rugby league and 64 netball teams from throughout the state for the iconic 40th annual Queensland Independent Secondary Schools Confraternity and 20th annual QISSN Carnivals last week.
Bundaberg’s Christian Brothers College, which closed in 1983, along with the city’s then girls’ Catholic high school, Loyola College, to pave the way for the co-educational Shalom College, inaugurated the Confraternity event in 1980 with six teams competing and it has grown to become one of the premier schoolboy rugby league carnivals in Australia, producing many Australian and Queensland State of Origin representatives, as well as countless NRL players.
Welcome to Country given by Byron Broome.
Shalom also created the QISSN carnival in 2000 with 16 teams participating but it has also grown exponentially, also producing a number of Test and numerous National Netball League players.
While the competitions were based at two different venues within the city, all players and team staff, plus family members of many, were among the congregation of over 2,000 which packed the Bundaberg Multiplex for the combined Opening Ceremony Mass on the Sunday night. Our Parish Priest Fr Peter Tonti led a spiritually uplifting service which included a Welcome to Country, Liturgical Dance, and blessing of a rugby league jersey and netball skirt from all teams.
Captains are Harrison Bull (rugby league) and Tayla Pearson (netball) giving the Player's Oath
On the field and the court, all games were also played with great spirit in the finest tradition of the carnivals and at the end of four days of fierce league competition, with a rest day on the Wednesday, Ignatius Park Townsville claimed the blue riband Confraternity Shield, with the other divisional winners being St Patrick’s Mackay, Clairvaux MacKillop Brisbane, Shalom, Holy Spirit College Mackay and the Combined St Mary’s Maryborough/St Patrick’s Gympie side. The friendly rivalry was just as intense in the netball which was played over five days, with Somerset College Mudgeeraba claiming their maiden QISSN Shield, and the other divisional silverware won by Marymount Burleigh Waters, Canterbury College Waterford, Chanel Gladstone, Ryan Townsville, St Michael’s Merrimac, St John Fisher Bracken Ridge and St James Spring Hill.
Congratulations to Shalom Principal Mr Dan McMahon and the organising committees on staging two more outstanding carnivals.