Group 10 president Linore Zamparini expects selectors to name a crack first grade side for next weekend's Western derby with Group 11 after his board decided to move an entire round to free up the competition's best players.
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Group 10 will tackle Group 11 at Forbes on Saturday, June 15 and instead of making the players selected back up the day after for their clubs Zamparini and his board has put a halt to their competition.
Group 10 will stage a general bye that weekend and has moved the scheduled round 10 games to the weekend of August 3-4, a vacant wash-out round on the 2019 draw.
There's now no extra weekend in the draw to allow for any potential weather-affected rounds, like we had in 2018 when snow in Oberon, and a spate of road closures around the region, forced the abandonment of a full weekend of footy across the competition.
... the Sunday off takes the pressure off them. The only reason players won't play will be through injury.
- Group 10 chairman Linore Zamparini
Group 10 selectors will announce their squads for the western rep round on Thursday and Zamparini is expecting the first grade outfit to be a seriously formidable one designed to help Group 10 win a second consecutive clash against their neighbouring red and black rivals.
"The change to the draw will ensure we avoid the boys backing up and there were a few issues with ground availability that weekend anyway, so it works out well," the long-running Group 10 president said.
Group 10 will also name an under 18s squad and league tag rep outfits for next Saturday's games against Group 11 at Spooner Oval.
Group 10 won last year's game 40-28 at Bathurst but there's at least five players - Sam Dwyer (Group 11), Tom Satterthwaite (injury), Jeremy Gordon (injury), Chris Grevsmuhl (injury) and Josh Rainbow (retired) - that won't be in the side in 2019.
Other than that, Zamparini says Group 10 will head to Forbes brimming with talent.
"For sure, and the Sunday off takes the pressure off them. The only reason players won't play will be through injury," he added.