On the night, which was well attended by about 60 people, the Redbacks were commended by the club for the way that they carried themselves on the field. 

“One of the board members stood up and basically expressed real gratitude at the season and the behaviour of the fellas,” Redbacks coach Nick Kemp said. 

“We got a commendation from the club on how they all behaved, so we got really strong support.”

Although the team only won two matches for the year, Kemp said that he was extremely pleased with the last half a dozen rounds.

“It was a really strong end of the season,” Kemp said. 

“We competed very hard for the last six games, obviously won two, drew one, and were only narrowly defeated in a couple, so [it was a] really good way to finish the season.” 

This effort was impressive considering that the Redbacks were forced to wait until the last minute to register a side for 2018 due to a lack of numbers, and continued to struggle with player availability for the first half of the year. 

There is good reason to believe that 2019 will not see the same struggles, Kemp said. 

“We’ve built the numbers pretty strong,” he said. 

“We’ve had a number of players who’ve been playing in Canberra in first grade and around the place commit to next season. 

“It’s looking much better than it has for the last couple of the years, the culture of the club has built pretty strong and we’re pretty confident.”