On the board

Last Thursday saw the Cobras take to the field for their first game of competition. They were up against a team of old heads and young legs in the UQ Lovers.

Most of the Cobras had been at training a couple of weeks ago and 4 of them were in the winning team from the Brisbane Indoor Championships. As a result of this preparation, the Cobras started the game with great intensity, blowing UQ out of the water to take half 8-1. This was achieved through smart decision making, good execution, and all round good looks. Exploiting some of UQ's newer players also helped, but these blokes will surely come along in leaps and bounds before these 2 teams meet again.

During the 2nd half, the Cobras decided to try some different styles of both offense and defence. A combination of this and of a drop in intensity saw the Lovers get a few points on the board, although the lead was never seriously in doubt. After reverting back to the way the started the game, the Cobras closed things out 15-7 to record a win in their very first outing and move to 2nd on the BPL table.

Next week they take on the top of the table Moreton Bay Buggers, which will be a big test for this new team against a team that has reverted to selections for this season of BPL. The Cobras will need to bring a big game to match it with Big Mike and the Bugs.

New Hatchling

In their bid to be the best team in Brisbane, the Cobras have recruited the AFDA's Director of High Performance, Mr Piers Truter (aka Mr Blair Sheard). Piers will be presented with his very own Zone uniform and will form part of the strong team that is the Cobras. First game this Thursday night against UQ Lovers.


Piers in his days as a Cobra wrangler

Cobras slither in

The Cobras made their first showing last night with an appearance at the training night for Season 2 of the BPL, along with the 3 of the other 4 teams (did anyone really expect Dojo to be there?).

The night was pretty low key. Started with a jersey presentation and, with everyone kitted out in their sweet new Zone shirts and shorts, a quick warm up and dump-swing-score drill ensued before some mini was played. The main aim of the night was to get people used to playing with people they had never played with. The progress made through the night was quite dramatic, and it was good that we didn't wait until the first round to have this opportunity.

After a bit of intra-team scrimmaging, we then played off against the only BPL team with selections, the Moreton Bay Buggers, on the new porta-fields. Firstly can we say that these lined porta-fields were great. It was so much easier than having stoppages in play to check whether someone was in/out and made it feel a lot more professional. The actual game itself was, as Mike put it, a risky game. Both teams were quite keen to put it long and both team tried a mix up of both zone and man, and tried new combinations on both O and D. Score wasn't kept, but both captains agreed that the game was tight and couldn't pick a team that really ran away with it.

The real deal starts next week with the first game of the season (barring a bye round) so tune in to find out how the Cobras go in losing their real game virginity.