The Drillers finished in last place during the 2018 campaign with a 1-7 record.

By Jeromy Corrigan

Local Football

Drillers to not take field in 2019

May 15, 2019 | 7:43 AM

There will be no Alberta Football League team in Grande Prairie in 2019.

The Grande Prairie Drillers will not be taking the field this season and as Co-President Chad Wiebe shared to EverythingGP, the new board has been dealing with a number of issues over the past few months.

“It is a series of things. There were just a lot of hurdles unfortunately that started as of a couple of months ago. We basically had a new board this year and the biggest hurdle the old board and I don’t want to say a name here, but an individual there that doesn’t want to give us the books for the team. Which obviously that created a hurdle not knowing there were bills to be paid from the previous season.”

Another one of those hurdles for the Drillers was their player numbers.

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Despite having a number of players who wanted to play this season, the issue for the team was commitment for both practices and games.

“Guys want to play but they don’t really want to commit,” stated Wiebe.

“It was starting to become a full-time job for the current board to get people out for both practices and games.”

What also didn’t help the Drillers was the new rule which was implemented by Football Canada which states teams must have 22 guys dressed for a game.

“The hardest game for us to get guys to come out to was Fort McMurray and the Fort Mac game was our first of the season,” added Wiebe.

Despite the Drillers not playing this season, the team will still hold their committed fundraisers in hopes to raise enough money to pay off the books.

The board is hopeful that the team can return for the 2020 campaign with a clean slate.