Tallon Smith

The Wodonga Wombats will be led by a brand new coaching team in 2026 as the club looks to return to the finals in the Goulburn Murray men’s competition and build on last year’s semi finals appearance in the league tag.

Former player Wonna Williams will take the role of men’s coach for the season beginning on May 2, while the experienced Sal Kaiwai will take charge of the women’s league tag side.

In terms of the pre-season for the men’s side so far, Williams said that the Wombats are looking healthy numbers wise and have been training well.

“It’s been going good, every other week we get good numbers,” he said.

“It’s a really good bunch of boys and we’ve just been training with the girls at the moment, working on our ball skills and all that, just to get ready for the start of the season.

“There’s more boys coming along and I hope we’re going to get a good crack at it this year.”

After some uncertainty around the men’s coaching appointment over the summer, Williams was announced as the club’s mentor quite late, in the last week of February.

However, the first-time coach said he was able to hit the ground running quickly, thanks to the existing friendships and connections he had with the squad from playing with the Wombats until he suffered a knee injury last season.

“I played last year with a few of the boys, so I guess it didn’t take me that long to get into it,” he said.

“It’s my first crack [at coaching], the boys came up to me looking for a coach and I [thought] why not, I didn’t want them to go without a coach for the season, so I put my hand up.”

As for his goals for the season, Williams said that after a couple of years outside the top five following the club’s successful 2022 season, securing a top four finish is the target this season.

“I think we’re all out there to win that comp, but if we make the finals it’ll be a good confidence boost for the boys and the club,” he said.

“If we can get a few games under our belt and win a few, [we’d be] happy to make the finals for the first time in a while.”

On the league tag side of things, the Wombats have made one of the biggest moves of the summer in securing the services of Kaiwai as coach for the upcoming season.

The key addition of the experienced mentor comes after the side made the semi finals last season, before bowing out in week one against Wangaratta.

Meanwhile, the competition has suffered an unexpected blow on the eve of the season following the shock withdrawal of two-time defending premiers Shepparton Eagles.

The loss of the Eagles means the competition will feature just six teams in 2026, and only three from Victoria, despite being an NRL-Victoria administered competition.