Eagles and Lions withdraw from rest of Senior season

THE Macleay Valley Eagles and Nambucca Valley Lions have made the decision that neither is able to continue fielding teams for the remainder of the 2025 AFL North Coast senior competition.

Both clubs have struggled with player numbers at various times throughout the year and came to the conclusion they would not be able to gather enough players to field a team in any of their remaining matches.

The Eagles have played in the Senior Mens competition this year, returning to the AFL North Coast fold for the first time in more than a decade.

The Lions were playing in the Reserves competition.

Both clubs expressed disappointment at the development over the weekend but have indicated they will be working over the off-season to make themselves stronger in a bid to return to the playing field.

The withdrawal of the two clubs meant that the rest of 2025 required amendments to fixtures to provide satisfactory content leading up to an including the finals.

The remaining clubs provided a set of suggestions on how to best move forward and during a meeting with club executive members on Monday night discussed the pros and cons of all suggestions.

The result of the meeting saw the season dates amended:

• Final Home & Away matches played on Saturday, August 16.
• Preliminary Finals (2nd vs. 3rd in all grades) played on Saturday, August 23 at Wiigulga Sports Complex
• Grand Finals (1st vs. winner of Preliminary Finals) played on Saturday, August 30 at C.ex Coffs International Stadium.

Community Football an Competition Manager, Brad Greenshields, was pleased with how quickly and well the clubs responded to the challenge the withdrawals provided and worked together to provide a alternate season end,” Greenshields said.