The 2026 SANFL Wheelchair Football League gets underway this Friday night at The Lights Community & Sports Centre, with Norwood taking on Woodville-West Torrens in Round 1.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Redlegs and Eagles have built a rivalry in recent seasons, having played in the past two Grand Finals.<\/p>\n
Four SANFL club swill again field teams in the 2026 competition, including Norwood, Woodville-West Torrens, West Adelaide and Central District, competing in a nine-round league, before the Grand Final and third V fourth playoff.<\/p>\n
The Eagles have been the premier SANFL Wheelchair Football side, having won back to back premierships.<\/p>\n
Norwood captain Grant Leonard said his side was ready and looking forward to Round 1.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are going well, and looking forward to Friday night, we start with a Grand Final rematch, so hopefully we can start out season off well,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have been training for a couple of months, we want to keep our fitness up, improve our ball skills.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe like to train as much as we can, a lot of us play other sports and try to keep fit. With the season around the corner we\u2019ve knuckled down into our football training.\u201d<\/p>\n
Leonard said his side was hoping to turn the tables on a formidable Eagles opponent.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve been a bridesmaide a couple of times (losing to the Eagles in the last two Grand Finals), so we are due for a win,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey have had the wood on us, but we always have good games, hopefully we can put it together.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are always chasing the ultimate (a Premiership), but we just have to work hard and stick to our processes. We know it\u2019s not going to be easy, but its a short season so you have to be on your toes the whole season.\u201d<\/p>\n
Norwood will head into 2026 with a similar squad to last season. John Musolino, who joined the club ahead of the 2025 season, transitions into the head coaching role this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a good squad, and know what each other can do, we just have to put it together,\u201d Leonard said.<\/p>\n
\u201cJohn\u2019s been really good, we like his approach, he makes us push hard and he wants to see success for Norwood, as much as we do as players.\u201d<\/p>\n
Norwood\u2019s Round 1 match will commence at 7:55pm, at Lightsview.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 2026 SANFL Wheelchair Football League gets underway this Friday night at The Lights Community & Sports Centre,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":740880,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-740879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=740879"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740879\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/740880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=740879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=740879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=740879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}