After more than 50 years of history, the final siren has sounded on the Tamar Valley Mini League's under-12s competition.
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President Shaun Crawford, who has been associated with the organisation for eight years, announced the news to the league's Facebook group on Thursday.
"I am saddened to be the one to let you all know that our committee has come to a decision that this fantastic competition has come to an end over 50 years," he wrote.
"This will leave a big hole in the Tamar of a Saturday morning and will be hard to forget.
"This competition gave so much for the young kids from the Tamar region."
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In the post, Crawford stated that AFL Tasmania had forced the competition to change to an under-11 league to comply with Auskick guidelines and for insurance purposes, as well as to assist NTJFA club Tamar Valley Demons' under-12 side.
He said this then created a lack of numbers throughout the league and alongside a dearth of volunteers, the unfortunate decision had to be made, with those involved sharing their memories.
AFL Tasmania Northern regional manager Aaron Roberts said an alternative solution was offered to the competition given their struggles with player numbers.
"AFL Tas and the Tamar Demons offered up an alternative solution if clubs could not field 18 players and that was a 12-14 a side Saturday competition at a central location using NTJFA under-10-11 modified game rules," Roberts said.
"The age change from under-12 to under-11 was suggested to the mini league to avoid competing with the existing Tamar Demons under-12 NTJFA Team.
"They voted to proceed with this proposal plus they had concessions to still recruit some overage players."
The Northern manager said that more than half of the competition's players were doubling up in NTJFA competition last season, meaning only about 20 children would be temporarily left without a game of football due to the league's disbandment.
Those players will be catered to by a new Demons under-10s side as well as their under-12 outfit.
"We are hoping from an AFL Tas standpoint that no child will be missing out on a game of football," he said.
"We will be working with Tamar Demons to set up two new Auskick centres in Beaconsfield and Exeter with AFL Tasmania actually supplying some casual workforce to make sure that gets off the ground in the next couple of months.
"We were fully supportive of the Mini League but unfortunately due to a lack of numbers and a lack of volunteer resources, it appeared that they weren't able to get going."
But Crawford said the age changes were going to be enforced upon the Mini League.
"We had no option because they said if we didn't do it, they wouldn't insure us ... because we aren't Auskick as such," Crawford said.
The league administration believes the competition was no threat to the Tamar Demons and their viability, creating another avenue for kids to play in.
"The competition down the river of a Saturday morning that's been going for 53 years that the kids loved, it's just going to be empty now - it's gone," Crawford added.