FAB 15: Meet Toowoomba’s newest Australian touch football superstars
Toowoomba and the Darling Downs is proving to be a hotbed of touch football talent with 15 players set to represent Australia in coming months. Meet the new stars here.
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Toowoomba is proving to be a hotbed of elite touch football talent.
Following in the footsteps of past football stars, 15 Darling Downs players will represent Australia in the coming months.
Toowoomba twins Jacob and Riley Madden are among those who will wear Aussie green and gold in the Trans-Tasman and Pacific Youth Cups.
“We’re both thrilled,” Riley said.
“Both of us made the 40 players under-18s squad back in 2020, but unfortunately Covid meant the competition was cancelled before it even begun.
“We are both super keen to finally get that opportunity to play.”
Being called into the Australian team was a huge surprise for twins who ‘jumped’ straight from club to national duties.
“Neither of us even made a Queensland representative team, so to get into an Aussie side is pretty cool,” Riley said.
“It’s really cool that we were selected again and especially in the same team.
“We’ve been playing since the age of 12 so, we have always been in the same teams, so this is definitely special.”
The former St Marys students, who now play and study at the University of Queensland, still have strong connections to Toowoomba, both lining up for Sharks in the winter touch season.
“We first started playing during the rugby league off-season initially to maintain our fitness, but we quickly fell in love with the game didn’t look back.”
The twins who just had their first training camp down in Sydney will continue to hone their skills ahead of the Cup in May.
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