Pam Dillon, Barkly Region Sport Education Coordinator, Tennant & District Times

Rainy weather did not deter the 11 schools who participated in the first ever Barkly region inter-school soccer carnival recently. There were beautifully sunny skies on the first day of great competition out at Purkiss Reserve.

In between games, teams attended health clinics run by Anyinginyi Health. Students still keen to be out on the field at the end of competition, helped their teachers from remote schools complete a mini roos coaching course run by John Moriarty Foundation.

On the second day everyone woke up to rainy weather and after some quick thinking, the competition was moved to an undercover basketball complex with smaller fields and five-a-side.

The students embraced the change and fast and controlled passes were witnessed in most games.

The atmosphere was electric during the grand final between Elliott 1 and Canteen Creek, at times the players could not hear the referees whistle due to the cheering.

At half time the score was 1 all but within minutes of the second half, Elliott 1 had the ball in the back of the net.

Canteen Creek players on the sideline jumped for joy when they equalised with a lovely kick that just slipped past Elliott’s goal keeper.

With one minute 30 seconds to go, we were thinking it was going to go down to a penalty shoot off, but Canteen Creek produced the winning goal, resulting in their players on and off the field go wild with excitement.

Canteen Creek were crowned winners with Elliott 1 runners up.
A big thank you to the staff of John Moriarty Foundation who set up fields and refereed over the two days, Anyinginyi Health for very informative health sessions for the students and all the staff for bringing their students in for a extremely successful carnival.

Plans have already begun for the 2023 carnival and we hope to see more schools within the Barkly come in to compete.

This article appeared in Tennant & District Times, 9 September 2022.