Rugby League Ipswich Chairman David Nugent has laid out the organisation’s long term goals to Ipswich Tribune Today heading into the 2026 season with the growth of the women’s game and preparation for an eight-side A Grade competition the major talking points.
The Ipswich Jets removed their reserve grade team from the competition this year and that position was taken up by the Goodna Eagles but there are a number of clubs who could be more than ready to play A grade in the coming seasons.
“In the area of (dealing with) growth, we can sustain a very competitive six-team competition and with the population growth and the growth that we’re experiencing in player sign ons in recent times, we wouldn’t want to rush it, but I think we can sustain eight teams at that first grade level and still remain competitive,” Nugent said.
“Nobody gets anything out of a team losing by 80 points so you don’t want to grow to a point where we are just asking anybody to throw a team together, you still want to make sure it’s an even contest week to week.
“Springfield are growing at a rate of knots so it’s going to be hard to hold back the tidal wave that is Springfield (from joining the A Grade competition).
“Swifts, when they get going in Ripley, we might see ourselves targeting for 2028 or 2030 to have an eight-team competition with Springfield in there as well,” he said.
The Ipswich region has one of the fastest growing populations in Australia and while expanding on already successful competitions is clearly a goal for Rugby League Ipswich, so is creating new ones.
As it stands, Rugby League Ipswich does not have a local club competition for females.
Although many clubs do have female teams, they are not yet facilitated by an Ipswich competition.
“Our female open age teams are all playing in southeast Queensland competitions, which means, for example, they host a game at Harrisville one weekend and then they have got to go to Sandgate the week after that, and then down to Tugan the week after that,” Nugent said.
“It is a bit hard for the ladies travel wise because they’re often the last one in the family unit that gets to play footy.
“For these ladies who want to play, they should be able to play against local sides.
“Wouldn’t it be lovely to Brothers to play Fassifern in A Grade men and A Grade women one weekend?
“Definitely a goal for our board is to fulfil that strategic objective of having our own local female competition.
“That goes right down to whether we could have under nines and under elevens or something like that in female only football, that would be a fabulous goal to reach,” he said.
Ipswich Tribune today has got season previews on three teams in today’s edition, with three more to come following round one.
