Description
Pre-order a navy replica player jersey for NAIDOC week 2023. Delivery is expected 1st week in July.
New Lambton Eagles Football Club premier league players will wear specially commissioned Indigenous jerseys to launch NAIDOC Week 2023. The club has partnered with multi-talented Aboriginal artist Ray Kelly jnr and clothing supplier Cliq to produce the kits, which feature a golden eagle soaring against a midnight blue background.
Kelly explains that the eagle, known as Birabahn, figures prominently in the Dreamtime telling of the local Awabakal people. “Birabahn represents the totem of the Awabakal and can be seen flying high above the waterways and mountains of the Newcastle area,” he says.
The design, which circles the abdomen section of the shirts, intertwines the traditional stories of the Awabakal and the history of the football club. White horse-shoe shapes within a cross-hatch ring symbolise the New Lambton soccer “tribe” – males and females, juniors and seniors, supporters and officials. Dots of various sizes indicate positive energy from healthy spaces, ideals of fair play and community spirit. A series of creeks – now stormwater drains – once converged at a wetlands environment teeming with wild food and resources.
Today those drains frame a field known officially as Alder Park but belovedly referred to as “The Nest” – home to the New Lambton Golden Eagles. It would come as no surprise to local football followers that the original custodians of this land were famous for being “strong and determined defenders of their territory”.
The Indigenous shirts will be unveiled as part of a “Welcome to Country” ceremony at 6.30pm on Friday, July 1, at Alder Park Sports Club on Bridges Road. The ceremony will include a performance from the Burrgati Dancers. Members, friends, players and the public are invited to help us mark the start of NAIDOC Week (an annual celebration named after the National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee).
Get in now or risk missing out. Proceeds will go to the Warlga Ngurra Aboriginal Women and Children’s Refuge.
