BATHURST High School went so long without Astley Cup success, but now they’re the ones to beat.
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Today marks the start of Bathurst’s attempt to snare their fifth cup in seven years as they travel to take on Orange High School in the opening tie.
The confidence that the breakthrough win in 2010 – the school’s first in 21 years – has brought out was clear to see in Tuesday’s assembly at Bathurst High.
Teams were greeted with cheers from the students, as they were introduced to Survivor’s Eye Of The Tiger, before getting into a rendition of the school’s Astley Cup cheer.
It was a showcase of how fired up the students were to get their campaign off to the perfect start and continue their winning ways.
Bathurst earned the Astley Cup back from Orange last year. Prior to Orange holding it, Bathurst enjoyed back-to-back wins.
Several senior students are lucky enough to have been a part of multiple Astley Cup teams at Bathurst High over these golden years.
Soccer team member Dylan White said the change in atmosphere around the school is easy to see.
“Everyone’s getting pumped and everyone’s keen. All the team members start to bond and there’s a great feel around the school,” he said.
“This is my favourite time of the year around Astley Cup and I’m always buzzing to be around it. This will be my last year, so I’m really looking forward to it.
“We had a strong [soccer] team last year, probably the strongest that it’s ever been.
“This year a few people are leaving, but I think with a few of the young boys coming in and the guys that stayed around last year, we can still win.
“We’ve just got to work as a team.”
Basketball is one sport in which Bathurst historically haven’t been able to get Orange or Dubbo’s measure.
Stephen Chapman, who will also be part of the soccer side, said the basketball squad are determined to turn last year’s results around.
“We got a few weeks in advance to train, so I feel pretty prepared and the team as a whole feel prepared. I feel pretty comfortable now, but before that I wasn’t too sure. Now I really think that we can win it,” he said.
“We went close to both teams in the basketball last year without a win. We’ve got some new team members this year and I feel like we can win both the basketball and the soccer.”
The sport in which Bathurst are hungriest for a win is the rugby league due to last year’s heartbreaking 30-28 loss, when Orange High snatched a try at the death.
Felix Quinn and Aidan Kilburn will be attempting to avenge that loss tomorrow morning.
“It’s looking pretty strong this year. We’ve got a lot of size and speed. We’ve been practising a fair bit because we’ve been in the University Shield. We’ve played a few games in that and really bonded as a team,” Quinn said.
“It was a younger team last year, so now we’ve developed, grown and we know what we need to do and sticking to our game plan should get us through.”
“We actually played Orange in University Shield this year. We beat them 44-4, so hopefully we can repeat that on Astley Cup and hopefully the pressure doesn’t get to us,” Kilburn added.
Bathurst defeated Orange 434 to 366 points in last year’s tie.
Orange will travel to face Dubbo College Senior Campus next week before Bathurst play host to Dubbo in the final tie.
Today’s opening day will feature tennis (9am, Wade Park), basketball (11.30am, PCYC), netball (12.45pm, PCYC) and boys’ soccer (2.15pm, OHS oval).