Kangaroos ready to bounce into 2025 season

Ahead of the 2025 AFL South Coast season, the Bega Valley Bombers and Tathra Sea Eagles have finalised an amalgamation to form one entity.

The formal amalgamation, twelve months after the clubs joined forces for the 2024 season sees a new brand and new vision for AFL in the Bega and Tathra communities.

The rebranded, Bega-Tathra Kangaroos will retain the history of both clubs through their colours, keeping the Sea Eagles’ maroon and white, with the Bombers’ black. Whilst the logo and guernsey are still being worked on behind the scenes, the new direction is exciting for both communities.

2024 Tathra president Cymmon Parker was inducted at the club’s inaugural AGM in November. Bega’s 2024 President, Imogen Champagne will deputise Ms Parker as the club’s Vice-President. Overall, the club became the first in the Sapphire Coast to have a full female executive committee and have built a strong General Committee with newly created, defined portfolios.

The collaborative approach has been critical to the success of the merger during 2024. Ms Champagne alluded to this by saying “Both clubs would like to thank everyone involved in this process, we appreciate the effort that’s gone into getting us this far. We now move on to the next stage of the amalgamation – setting up the new club.”

Aiding the formal amalgamation was how successful the 2024 season was for the club. The Bega-Tathra Under-15s qualified for the finals, whilst their Women’s side made yet another Grand Final.

Like her new Vice-President, Ms Parker was glowing in her endorsement of the 2024 season. “This year has been quite an eventful one, we started the season not knowing if we were going to get very many teams across the line, then entered into the Joint Venture with Bega and ended up at the point of having to close registrations for some teams. The positive vibe around the club after the implementation of the JV was incredible!”

The importance of maintaining the two clubs’ history whilst finalising the amalgamation wasn’t lost on the two club leaders. Ms Champagne told AFL Sapphire Coast “with Tathra’s long club history and Bega’s location as the epicentre of the far south coast we’re in a fantastic position as the Bega-Tathra Kangaroos to build a really strong footy club that will reenergise Aussie Rules in our area.”

The club has received the support from AFL NSW/ACT to formalise the amalgamation and participate in the 2025 AFL Sapphire Coast competition. Competition Manager, Casey White spoke positively about the hard work of all involved. “The amalgamation involved a significant amount of work by a working group consisting of longstanding members at both clubs.”

“The group worked tirelessly, meeting with AFL NSW/ACT regularly, in addition to club life members, and both clubs’ participant bases. With an already busy workload in the middle of the season, the contribution of this group cannot be understated and has the Bega-Tathra Kangaroos in a fantastic position ahead of the season.”

“On behalf of AFL Sapphire Coast, I want to thank everyone involved in the amalgamation, including the life members of both clubs. It no doubt would have been difficult to have conversations with the working group about the clubs merging. We wish the Bega-Tathra Kangaroos the best of success on and off the field.”

To play AFL with the Bega-Tathra Kangaroos, or any AFL Sapphire Coast club, search your postcode on the Play.AFL Locator.