Keeping Rugby Fives Fixtures on Track Through a Pandemic
Rugby Fives is one of those sports where the social side matters as much as the court craft. A typical Saturday at any club means a quick yarn over a cuppa before stepping onto the court, and that spirit does not vanish when fixtures have to be reshuffled.
Across Australia, Fives players are scattered between Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide and a handful of regional clubs that pack their gear for long drives to the nearest court. When public health orders tighten, those scattered communities feel the pinch in slightly different ways, from the lengthy Melbourne lockdowns to the shorter snap closures in New South Wales.
Planning fixtures for a niche sport through a pandemic is not the same as rearranging a local netball round. Fixture organisers have to weigh insurance rules, travel costs across state lines, the availability of volunteers who often run two or three clubs, and the awkward overlap with the AFL finals. Getting that balance right takes a calm head and a clear process.
This guide walks through what organisers, captains and volunteers actually did when the calendar fell apart, and how those lessons translate into practical routines any club can adopt when the next disruption hits.
Mapping the Fixture Calendar Before a Crisis Reaches the Door
The clubs that coped best in 2020 and 2021 were the ones that had already written down a rolling two-season calendar on a shared spreadsheet. Once the Victorian Chief Health Officer announced another round of restrictions, the administrators simply rewrote the affected weekends rather than starting from a blank page.
Map every fixture against three layers of risk: state government restrictions, club-level volunteer fatigue, and the cost of hiring courts. In Australia, courts are often shared with schools or paid for through council grants, so a sudden closure at the Royal Park complex in Parkville ripples through to school holiday programs in inner Melbourne as well as the senior competition.
Build a simple decision tree and pin it to the committee wall. If a state enters a lockdown of more than fourteen days, defer rather than cancel. If it is shorter than that, push the match to the following midweek evening, when amateur players in Sydney or Brisbane are usually willing to give up their arvo for a quick hit. Communicate the decision in writing within forty-eight hours of the announcement, even if it is just a placeholder saying the committee is reviewing options.
Rescheduling Matches Without Burning Out Volunteers
A fixture list is rarely the problem. The human side is. Volunteer secretaries, treasurers and referees tend to be the same few people across all the local sides, and asking them to rebuild a draw after every state lockdown is a quick way to lose them.
Rotate the workload. After each round of rescheduling, ask two new volunteers to handle the next batch of changes, even if they only manage the phone calls and the group chat messages. A captain in Adelaide might agree to take the bookings while a junior organiser in Brisbane handles the umpire allocation, and a parent from the school program can be looped in to chase late result entries.
Keep a single source of truth. A shared sheet with named tabs for home courts, away courts, player availability and result entry stops the old problem of three different spreadsheets telling three different stories. Pin the link at the top of the club's Facebook group or Discord channel so nobody has to chase it down on a Sunday morning after a long week at work.
Set a hard date by which any re-arranged fixture must be played, otherwise a penalty applies. In some Australian clubs the rule is that a deferred match must be completed within six weeks, or the away side forfeits. The rule sounds harsh but it stops drift and keeps the finals draw clear for everyone.
Hybrid Formats When Courts Stay Closed
There were stretches where every court in greater Melbourne sat dark, and even a quick hit-up at a mate's indoor wall was off the cards. Some enterprising clubs turned the lull into something useful by running hybrid fixtures: a virtual match analysis session, a skills challenge recorded on a phone, or a handicap round where players submitted scores from solo training at home.
The Rugby Fives Association helped by publishing simple rules for video challenges. Players film a thirty-second rally from a fixed camera angle, share it through the club group, and the committee scores the rally on technique, variety and footwork. It is not a substitute for a competitive match, but it keeps engagement alive and gives newer players a reason to keep showing up online each week.
Pair each hybrid round with a debrief on a video call at a friendly time slot, such as a Sunday brekkie catch-up at nine a.m. local. Australian volunteers tend to be generous with their time on weekend mornings, especially when a flat white is involved. The casual tone keeps morale high and surfaces practical issues that would otherwise sit unsaid in a complaint thread for months.
Returning to Play Without Spreading Sickness
When the courts finally reopen, the temptation is to cram three rounds into the first weekend back. Resist it. A staged return, with smaller draws and earlier start times, gives players a chance to recalibrate and lets the committee check that hygiene supplies have not run out.
Sanitise the shared surfaces between each match: door handles, scoreboard buttons, the bench where players swap ends. Keep a roll of disinfectant wipes next to the court, and assign one person each night to top them up. In Australian clubs, that task often falls to the home captain by default, but it should be written down rather than left to muscle memory.
Limit shared equipment where possible. Players bring their own hand grips, water bottles and towels, and the club stops offering communal fruit bowls. If the budget allows, leave a sealed bag of soft sports tape and grip powder at the entrance for anyone who has forgotten their kit. A small cost here avoids a much bigger cost if a player picks up an avoidable strain early in the return.
Run a quick welfare check before the first ball is struck. Anyone with a persistent cough, a temperature above the usual baseline, or who has had a recent bingle in their household should stay home without needing a medical certificate. The culture of pushing through that runs deep in Australian sport is useful for a long tournament, but it works against fixture safety during an outbreak.
Sustaining Community and Inclusive Participation
The hardest part of pandemic fixture management is keeping the social fabric intact. Many older players who joined Rugby Fives for the company as much as the competition quietly drift away when fixtures are cancelled for months on end. A short phone call from a committee member, even just a five-minute chat about how their week is going, makes a bigger difference than any email newsletter.
Involve school programs early in the rebuild. Australian schools that run Rugby Fives through PE sessions often rely on a single teacher to coordinate fixtures, and that teacher is also juggling cricket carnivals, swimming carnivals and the odd interschool chess match. Give them a single point of contact, a printed fixture card, and a backup date for every match in case the school's exposure to a wider illness outbreak forces a quick change.
Make the most of the local landscape. A club in Brisbane might pair a fixture with a free sausage sizzle at a community centre, using COVID-safe catering practices. A club in Perth could partner with a nearby café that is keen to fill its quiet arvo trade with a steady stream of thirsty players. These small links keep the competition rooted in the neighbourhood and remind local councils why the sport deserves ongoing grant support.
Track who is missing, not just who is playing. A rolling attendance sheet with a colour code for players absent for more than three weeks gives the committee an early nudge to call, visit or invite them back through a friendly hit-and-giggle rather than a competitive fixture.
A free fixture planner is ready to download from the Rugby Fives Association website, and the fixtures officer is on standby to walk your committee through the first rebuild. Pull together two or three volunteers from your club, a copy of last season's draw, and a willingness to redraw rather than just rearrange. Reach out today so that the next time the calendar wobbles, your club simply bends with it rather than breaks.
