Gold Coast Football Club members will be admitted free to Saturday’s interstate double-header at Fankhauser Reserve, Southport.
All they need to do is show their 2010 membership card at the gate to gain entry to the Queensland U21 clash with Victorian Amateur U21s from 11am, and the main game between Queensland and Tasmania from 2pm.
There is set to be a strong Gold Coast presence in the Queensland side, with Southport favorite son Jason Cotter to coach the Maroons for the fourth year in a row.
Cotter will be looking to square the win/loss ledger with his second victory, having coached Queensland to a magnificent 11-point win over Tasmania in Launceston in 2007 before a 73-point loss to a slick Western Australian outfit in Townsville in 2008 and a 49-point loss to Tasmania in Hobart last year.
This will be the first occasion in the recent times in which Cotter and the Maroons will get the Apple Islanders on home soil.
As many as 12 players with a Gold Coaster connection, either as homegrown locals or adopted talent, are in line for a Queensland jumper after being included in a 26-man squad.
Ben Merrett, son of ex-AFL champion and Southport assistant-coach Roger Merrett, is in line for his senior interstate debut after representing Queensland at U21 level in 2007-08.
Other Southport players in the Queensland squad are State team stalwarts Daniel Wise, Matty Payne and Kurt Niklaus, plus boom 2010 recruits Cleve Hughes, Darren Pfeiffer, Cam Maclaren and Dean Putt.
Gold Coast AFL club training squad member Todd Grayson, playing with Labrador in the QAFL, is in line to fly the Tigers’ flag in the Queensland side with clubmate Todd Featherstone, while Dayne Zorko is the lone Broadbeach player in the State Open squad after he skippered the U21 side last year.
Completing the Gold Coast connection is Brisbane Lions rookie and ex-Labrador youngster Claye Beams, younger brother of rising Collingwood star and ex-Southport midfielder Dayne Beams.
Beams, who has impressed in his first season at the Gabba, has been given a special release by Lions coach Michael Voss to play at interstate level in what shapes as an important stepping stone in his overall development.
Former Lions players set to wear the Queensland jumper are Redland pair Scott Clouston and Daniel Dzufer.
The Tasmanian side will be coached by ex-Fitzroy and North Melbourne midfielder Mathew Armstrong, who in 1999-2000 was a member of Leigh Matthews’ coaching staff at the Lions.
It will be his second year in charge of the Tasmanian side after he guided his side to a win over Cotter’s Maroons 12 months ago.
Heading the Tasmanian side is ex-Geelong and North Melbourne AFL player Cameron Thurley.
The squads are:-
QUEENSLAND: Aspley: Jamie Sheahan; Brisbane Lions Reserves: Claye Beams; Broadbeach: Dayne Zorko; Labrador: Todd Featherstone, Todd Grayson; Morningside: Damien Bonney, Mark Kimball, Austin Lucy, Aaron Rogers, Paul Shelton; Mt Gravatt: Nathan Gilliland; NT Thunder: Cameron Ilett, Shaun Tapp, Kenrick Tyrrell; Redland: James Charlesworth, Scott Clouston, Daniel Dzufer, Adam Mueller; Southport: Cleve Hughes, Cameron MacLaren, Ben Merrett, Kurt Niklaus, Matt Payne, Darren Pfeiffer, Dean Putt, Daniel Wise.
TASMANIA: Sam O’Keefe, Brad Macdonald, Scott Stephens, Brennan Savage, Shane Wager, Jeremy Howe, Stuart Whitelaw, Cameron Thurley, Brian Finch, Jon Bowring, Mathew Drury, Ollie Di Venuto, Mitchell Hills, Beau Green, Darren Crawford, Michael Cassidy, Cameron Blight, Ken Hall, Jackson O’Brien, Ben Reynolds, Jaymes Baker, Jaye Bowden. Darren Banham, Jesse Wells.
