Pine Rivers United Sports Club

Pine Rivers United
Full name Pine Rivers United Sports Club
Founded 1967
Ground Wendy Allison Park
Chairman Margaret Hale
Head Coach Wayne Heath
League Brisbane Premier League Division 1
Division 1 2nd

Pine Rivers United are an Australian football (soccer) club from Strathpine, a suburb of Pine Rivers, just north of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. The club was formed in 1967, and will play in Brisbane Premier League Division 1 in 2011 after being relegated.

Pine Rivers United Sports Club is located in the heart of the Moreton Bay Region (formerly Pine Rivers Shire) at Wendy Allison Park, facing busy Samsonvale Road, Strathpine. It is a fully licensed club with gaming machines and caters for men's soccer, women's soccer and junior soccer as well as netball and social darts. Whilst a multi-sports club, the Club's core sport is First Division soccer and as such attracts talented junior players and their families from outlying areas such as Redcliffe, Caboolture and Bribie Island and nearby districts such as Sandgate, Albany Creek, Petrie and Kallangur.

History

The Club was formed as a football club in 1967 by a local man Jack Gurteen, from a group of Pine Rivers High School students who used to kick a ball around in their lunch time. The lads approached Jack and a game was arranged with Redcliffe City U14's at Redcliffe. The Pine Rivers team lost 5-3. As a result, parents of the team decided to get together and start a club. At the same time a number of youngsters from Lawnton State School came along and asked for a game. They were 9–12 year olds. Jack arranged a game against Zillmere, but Rivers lost 16–0. The Club later became incorporated as a multi-sports club. The current clubhouse was built in 1978. The club is affectionately nicknamed 'The Predators'.

1989 saw promotion to the Brisbane Premier League (or 'BPL', then known as XXXX league) with a high mid-table finish, followed by a finals appearance the following season under the stewardship of former Brisbane City and Motherwell veteran Bob Hamilton. Young players at this time were Noel Carrol, and Clayton Koch, who was sold at the end of the 1990 season to Sydney Croatia FC.

Present day

Pine Rivers United were participating in the Brisbane Premier League, and were a team that was usually expected to finish in the mid-lower regions of the table. In 2009, there were 13 teams participating in the premier league, and after round three of the 2009 season Pine Rivers sat last on zero points. After a turn of fortunes during the late stages of the season the club heroically pushed out of the relegation zone to secure 10th place out of the 13 clubs participating. Pine Rivers' main rivals are the high performing Rochedale Rovers, who finished 2nd in the 2009 season. The last time the two clubs played, a late strike from Seb Thatcher in the dying stages of the game secured a well fought 2-1 win against a team boasting many experienced Hyundai A-league players.

However, in the 2010 season the club finished 14th out of 14 teams, and were dropped to the Brisbane Premier League division 1 as of 2011. The club has never been able to climb back into the Brisbane Premier League, although the 2012 season saw the club finish 2nd on the table to Albany Creek Excelsior, however winning the grand final 3–1 over Logan Lightning. That wasn't enough to be promoted back into the Premier League, as Albany Creek and Logan Lightning both got promoted.

Sponsors

The clubs main sponsors are Ulhsport, Buffalo Sport, and the Bank of Queensland.

Players

Pine Rivers is a semi-professional club, meaning that it usually only offers part-time contracts to the playing staff. The club is widely regarded as having many good players, and many young upcoming talents, including Jackson Campbell, Rielly Campbell and Dean Campbell (all brothers), as well as some well-known players to the top division in Brisbane such as Corey Hagell, Sam Young and Andy Lincoln. The club has a very strong reserve team, coached by Craig Davey, which boasts many young talents and a very strong Under 20 team, coached by Nathan Knox.

External links

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