Corowa Rutherglen unveils plans for second season back in Ovens and Murray
Corowa Rutherglen continues to make strong strides after returning from recess in 2024. We get an insight into the leadership on and off the field heading into next year.
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While John Longmire won’t take on an official role with Corowa Rutherglen after his coaching retirement, the family name is continuing to lead the club’s rebuild.
Longmire’s brother Beau has been appointed as the club’s new president as the Roos prepare for their second season out of recess.
Last month the premiership winning Swans coach stepped down after 14 years but he will still remain at the club in an executive position.
John, before his AFL career with North Melbourne, was a star for Corowa Rutherglen, winning the goalkicking league medal in the thirds before kicking 82 goals as a 16-year-old, which attracted AFL scouts.
His brother said at this stage nothing is being done to bring him back into a role.
Last year John ran a training session at the club before Christmas, as the team came back from recess, before coaching Sydney to the grand final this year.
“He has done and will continue to support the club anyway he can,” Beau said.
“He’s involved along the way and will help anyway he can.”
Beau takes over as co-president, with Rowena Black, replacing Graham Hosier who helped the club come back after spending 2023 in recess.
He joins the board after being part of the junior club while his kids played at the Kangaroos.
One of them, Jedd Longmire, plays for the club while he also plays VFL football for Werribee.
Beau was also a handy player, becoming a leading fullback in the Ovens and Murray league for Corowa Rutherglen and winning three premierships.
With his kids now playing senior footy he felt it was the perfect opportunity to continue to be part of the club but in another role.
Beau said the team would look to continue the work done by Hosier previously.
“Graham’s been involved as president for a number of years and done a good job,” he said.
“Coming out of recess has never been done in our competition before. It’s been a tremendous amount of effort and hard work.”
The new co-president expects the hard work to continue heading into 2025.
In 2024 the team won one senior game and have already made a raft of signings for next year including the signing of new coach, former AFL player Daryn Cresswell.
Cresswell joins after guiding South Cairns to the premiership in Cairns last season.
He’s also coached the Wangaratta Rovers and Wodonga Raiders in the Ovens and Murray before.
Beau revealed the focus for the club was on a few areas.
The first was recruiting, the second retention and the third to incorporate juniors into senior footy.
While some might look at the signings as a ‘chips in’ to get to the top, Beau said the focus was on getting the club viable again.
Finals football would be a bonus.
“At the end of 2024 there’s still a significant amount of improvement (needed),” he said.
“We had seven regular reserves players in 2024. We need another 15 reserves players.
“We were lucky to retain the large amount of list for 2024. But we still need some top end talent and some depth players and some addition social players who just want to play socially for football.
“We’ve still got a long way to go to sustain our list.”
Beau said Cresswell had been a major help with building a squad for 2025.
“Ultimately it’s multi faceted having Darryn,” he said.
“He’s got Ovens and Murray experience and is one of the most hard working footy people I’ve come across. It’s not reputation it’s hard work when it comes to time and investment and recruitment.
“When you add that to a strong local junior program. That’s where I come in.
“We’re finding we can get across a lot of areas.”
Beau said the junior program was in a strong position with the under-16s making the grand final last season.
He added in previous seasons the under-14s and under-16s had also been successful.
As the club looks to improve on the field, off it, the team is hopeful things will also get better.
The team went into recess in 2023 off the back of a player exodus through Covid and devastating floods which destroyed the clubrooms at John Foord Oval.
Almost 26 months on the club has only just got access to the rooms back.
But there has been no compensation, as yet, with the insurance claim still outstanding.
“We still haven’t received any insurance money for the flooding,” Beau said.
“It’s a council owned oval and they still have a flood claim outstanding. It’s a substantial figure still outstanding.
“It’s been really frustrating and we went through the whole season with no social space, limited change room space.
“It had a bigger impact than anyone could imagine.”
The Kangaroos will hopefully change the lack of social space and change rooms for 2025 but it will come at a cost to them.
While the council has provided plenty of support, Corowa Rutherglen will have to go at it alone.
“The reality is we won’t be able to remediate the building to same level,” Beau said.
“We don’t have the funding.
“But we have to create a space for social and home and away (short term).
“We’re in the process to fix it long term and there are two areas of attack, firstly to get into the facility in the short term and hopefully allow ourselves a three year project to build new change room and overall facility.
“Any new facility will have to come above a designated flood level.”
Beau revealed the club has applied for a federal grant for the rebuild.
The club has until April 19, their first home game, to sort out the change and social rooms.
The season starts on April 12 for the Kangaroos against the Wangaratta Magpies.
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