Southern Suburbs Rugby League Club president reveals how it has revitalised its senior program
From nearly three years without a win to undefeated, find out the story behind Australia’s most dramatic rugby league revival of the year.
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Southern Suburbs Rugby League Club has a proud and storied history in the Far North Queensland Rugby League, but to say the club was in a rough spot for the past few years would be an understatement.
Prior to the 2025 FNQRL season, the Cockatoos hadn’t won a single men’s A-grade or reserves game since midway through the 2022 season, spending two-and-a-half years languishing at the bottom of the ladder.
Internally the club has known for some time it was on the right track.
What they couldn’t have predicted is boasting an undefeated record seven rounds into the season.
The club sits atop the A-grade ladder with an undefeated 6-0 record while the reserves are 5-1.
Suburbs president Danny Maher said the resurgence has been more than a year in the making.
“It wasn’t so much the end of 2024, it was more so the end of 2023 that some changes started to be made,” Maher said.
“At that stage, the club hadn’t won a game in a season and a half in either senior men’s grade. The volunteer base was full of good people but was burnt out.
“There was a disruptive element that had emerged within the playing group that meant the club lost some good players, including players that were Suburbs juniors. That all contributed to a downward spiral.”
The Genesis
Maher and his family have a long history in FNQ rugby league and sports in general, but it had been some time since he had taken an active role in the scene.
“I hadn’t been involved in the game for the previous 18 months, before that I was on the FNQRL board. I had stepped down due to health reasons,” he said.
“Suburbs put a call out for help, and a meeting of interested people was organised.
“My family is more known for cricket in Far North Queensland, but rugby league was the first organised sport I ever played, and the first club I ever played for was Southern Suburbs when I was a six-year-old.
“I went to the meeting along with Chey Bird (chairman of the FNQRL) and listened in and met with some great volunteers who were longstanding Suburbs members.
“Long story short, less than a month later I was president.”
The Process
Maher knew that the process wouldn’t be quick if the Cockatoos were going to be brought out of the doldrums and transformed into a powerhouse.
“I knew that with the heritage and pride within the club, there were good bones around which to build,” he said.
“In that first season it was very much about learning what was working well and what wasn’t.
“It became clear that we needed to revamp our coaching team, and not just the A-grade coach but the reserves and under-19s as well.
“That was our first priority, was to see who might be available and figure out what kind of coaches we wanted.”
That process saw them land on the name Graham Clark, a highly-respected figure in FNQ league dating back decades to his time with the now defunct Cairns Cyclones in the Queensland Rugby League, and on to his coaching career in a variety of positions in the FNQRL.
“I knew Graham wasn’t in a senior coaching role at the time, and he has a phenomenal track record, so I reached out to him and we met toward the end of the 2024 season with the view of rebuilding for 2025,” Maher said.
The Star Player
The right culture and the right coaching staff was brought in and it was combined with a star player spearheading the group on-field.
Maher and the rest of the committee realised they couldn’t just bring in any old recruit from out of town or elsewhere in the competition, it had to be someone with deep ties to the Suburbs community.
“We haven’t got the financial capacity that a club like Atherton or certainly Cairns Brothers or even Mareeba have, so we had to build on the back of heritage and values,” he said.
“To do that we needed a marquee player with history at the club, and Aidan Day was the standout on that front.
“We talked to Aidan, who was travelling from Gordonvale to Atherton for the games and training, and he agreed to come back.”
As is so often the case, once you get one, more will follow, and off the back of them nailing their coach and marquee player signing, Suburbs’ recruitment drive was off to the races.
“As a result a number of players followed (Day), and in addition we had a few players who were Suburbs juniors that had then left return to the club,” Maher said.
“Suddenly we were starting to get this real buy-in based on a shared history and values, and more importantly we’re seeing that off the field even more so than on it.
“On field success comes from off field success, it’s not the other way around.”
The Future
The focus now is on ensuring this isn’t a one-season wonder and Maher revealed how the club plans to build a sustainable club which can be as inspirational off the field as on it.
“We want to just continue building on what we’ve started, we’ve got sponsors now who want to get on board with the club,” he said.
“And they’re liking more than just the winning, they’re liking what they’re seeing in the community from Suburbs.
“People want to be associated with the club, and much of that also has to do with the contribution that we make to the First Nations community.
“I would say around 98% of our playing group has Indigenous heritage, and we’ve been able to make a positive impact on their communities.
“We have a lot of disadvantaged and lower income families in our club, and so we’re able to provide them opportunities as far as playing at a representative level, where otherwise they might not purely because their parents can’t afford to pay for the RISE program for instance.
“It’s a great program that Northern Pride do, but only if you can afford the fees which a lot of our kids can’t. But we’re able to sponsor them to go to these programs.”
Suburbs’ next on-field test will be against Mossman-Port Douglas at Coronation Park, a game which will be live streamed from 6pm Saturday on KommunityTV.
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Originally published as Southern Suburbs Rugby League Club president reveals how it has revitalised its senior program
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