Brisbane Roar’s NPL squad will kick off their first game in the Kappa Pro Series at 4pm this Sunday 12 February at AJ Kelly Park against Brisbane City.
The National Premier League Queensland season will begin on Saturday 25 February at AJ Kelly Park, also against Brisbane City. The Under 23’s will kick off at 2pm with the NPL squad kicking off at 7.30pm.
Both teams will play their home matches at AJ Kelly Park this NPL Men’s season.
Squad Lists:
Brisbane Roar NPL Squad 2023
Goalkeepers: Lachlan Duke, Cardiff Pond
Defenders: Nathan Geyer, Amanhomm Khamis, Cameron Anderson, Trent Millard, Cher Deng, Zahi Addis, James Nikolovski
Midfielders: Noah McGrath, James Murphy, Riley Gill, Josip Millicevic, Josh Dimarco, Corban Burrowes, Aaron Dempsey, Damon Gorrel, Nathan Nguyen
Attackers: Ty Cobb, Thomas Waddingham, Fernando Nash
Brisbane Roar U23 2023
Goalkeeper: Sean O’Connor
Defenders: Isiah Quinn, Andrew McLeod, Mustafa Mohammad, Lucas Herrington, Oliver Reid, Ethan Jones, Eremugo Debele, Kobi Griffiths, Zane North, Dominic Amaya
Midfielders: Edward Ince, Kade McDougall, Quinn Macnicol, Arthur de Lima, Sean Almond, Tate Baldwin, Nigel Poinapen
Attackers: Iyendja Bukuna, Mahdi Alawie, Declan Warnes, Deegan Brook
The Kappa Pro Series
The Kappa Pro Series is a new men’s tournament for NPL Queensland and FQPL 1 teams with support from official apparel partner Kappa, that begins on Friday February 10.
The Cup consists of four pools of six that will battle it out in the initial five rounds of the knock-out tournament starting this weekend, ahead of the 2023 NPL Men and FQPL 1 Men competitions.
Ahead of the Cup this weekend, players and coaches are seeing it as a great initiative from Football Queensland to provide inexperienced players with opportunities to grow and is beneficial in getting some games in before the season kicks off.
“The Kappa Pro Series provides us with a variety of opportunities. It gives us the chance to play against clubs and players that we wouldn’t play in our league season, but it also provides our players with additional competition matches with some having points to prove,” NPL Head Coach Grossmann said.
“We want to do well in the cup, but also we want to provide an opportunity to those who are performing, and it’s a great platform for them to be rewarded,” he added.
Midfielder Noah McGrath is excited to be getting some starting minutes in the NPL and hopes he can eventually progress through to the Isuzu UTE A-League system.
“I am excited for it, and I think it’ll be good for the boys to get a hit-out in the Kappa Cup before the NPL season starts. I’m excited for the debut,” McGrath said.
Brisbane NPL Men 2023
Chris Grossmann is placing a key focus on consistency in the upcoming NPL season after his side finished 11th last season and aims to get the squad back to its competitive best.
“If we have a good start to the year, I think with this young ambitious group anything is possible and the challenge has been set to them early on in preseason. We want to emulate what the group did two years ago now but know there is a lot of hard work against tough opposition to get there,” Grossmann said.
“We know it will be a long tough season, but we must maintain our status in the NPL which is a key building block for next year and years to come.”
Following the disappointing outcome last year, Grossman believes that those players have gone from being inexperienced individuals to now moving forward from a season that they could take a lot away from.
“They understand what’s at stake this season, but the boys came back in a good frame of mind and I’m excited for the year ahead. Those boys are now 15, 20, 25 games more experienced coming from a season where a lot of lessons were learnt individually and collectively,” he said.
Noah McGrath is an exciting product joining the NPL squad for the 2023 season, after coming from Lions FC where he won the U23 NPL Premiership last year.
“He’s an exciting acquisition from Lions, we saw him in the U23s grand final last year and he was a very pivotal part of what they did in their successful season. I’m excited to see how he goes with consistent minutes and opportunity in senior men’s football,” Grossmann said.
Grossmann believes that his squad is rich in young exciting players, and he aims to help them in developing the consistency they need to be competitive in the NPL and in becoming professional footballers.
Brisbane Roar U23 2023
Head Coach of the U23s Owen Baker is looking forward to training with a new young group that joined the Academy last year, as for many it will be their first-time playing football at this level.
“We are excited about that adjustment for them and the potential that they have and seeing how far they can develop over the course of the year,” Baker said.
The U23s will be welcoming Zane North after his U15 squad won both the NPL premiership and championship last year, all whilst remaining undefeated in the competition.
“Zane is a young centre back that performed very well, but he’s going to get some different tests and challenges this year so we’re looking to see how he handles that exposure in the NPL U23s league,” Baker said.
After finishing third on the ladder and going on to win the grand final last season, Baker has no doubt his squad will be aspiring for another trophy but wants to focus on the development of his players too.
“From my point of view, I will try to get the boys to want to win games but at the same time think about how we are doing everything possible to develop them on and off the field, so they’re ready for hopefully that next step which will be NPL football, and then professional football,” Baker said.
Zane North is excited to go up against stronger, faster and more difficult opponents as he prepares to enter his first NPL U23 season.
“It’s a different environment with different people, different coaches, but so far I am enjoying it,” North said.
“Last year we were versing my age group and this year we are versing older boys, so it’ll be more challenging because they’ll be better technically,” he added.
The central defender is aiming for the stars as he aspires to play for the Roar just as his father Jade North did, and this is a step in the right direction for the youngster.
Luxury Paints are the new front-of-shirt sponsor for the NPL squad after being a long-serving sponsor of the Brisbane Roar. They have reinvigorated their partnership with the club by being on the front of our NPL squad’s shirts this season. Brisbane Roar is proud to continue its partnership with Luxury Paints.
