East Kimberley Football League looks to July 4 start date

The East Kimberley Football League is continuing to try and push for a season with a new start date of July 4.

Four teams would take part in the competition including the Balgo Tigers, Kundat Djaru Cats, Kururrungku Roos and last year’s grand final winners Halls Creek Hawks.

The season re-start had been mooted to clubs to begin as early as tonight with a Plunkett Shield clash between the Ord River Magpies and Kununurra Demons.

Both clubs, however, pulled out of the competition earlier this week following on from the withdrawal of the Port Wyndham Crocs.

EKFL president Wayne Paul told The Echo the competition at this stage would run for nine rounds and finish with two rounds of finals.

“We think it’s important to have footy and it’s good for the mental health for communities and the population,” he said.

“Everyone one has been locked up so it’s good to give people something that’s healthy.

“We’ve got teams interested so we’re going to try and progress that.

“We’re here for footy. It’s about trying to get it up and running.”

Port Wyndham Crocs president Mark Timms said the club wrote a letter to the league saying it would not join in with an EKFL season this year.

“While Crocs won’t be able to regularly field a side we are looking at doing some carnival-style footy with some other clubs this year,” he said.

“2020 is such a strange year, we would have been a week from finals with the original fixtures so the season is over.

“We need to look to alternatives and think outside the box of a regular season to give the extended community football in 2020.”

Ord River Magpies Football Club president Mark Davey said it was a shame but it just did not seem like a season would go ahead.

“The EKFL have tried really hard to get something going officially,” he said.

“It just looks like all the clubs will look after their own areas and might do some matches unofficially to keep a bit of interest going and top up revenue for the clubs.”

The EKFL says it will get started with a double-header at Halls Creek Oval starting at 2pm with the Cats and Hawks at 2pm followed by the Tigers and Roos at 4pm.