Sunshine Coast Football Club is a semi-professional Australian

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

club based in the

Sunshine Coast Sunshine Coast may refer to: * Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia **Sunshine Coast Region, a local government area of Queensland named after the region **Sunshine Coast Stadium * Sunshine Coast (British Columbia), geographic subregion of the Br ...

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

. Nicknamed "The Fire", the club last competed in the Football Queensland Premier League, the third tier of Australian Football.

History

Sunshine Coast FC were founded in 2007 by Noel Woodall in order to participate in the inaugural season of the Queensland State League, a competition designed to bridge the gap between the

A-League A-League Men, also known as the Isuzu UTE A-League for sponsorship reasons, is a professional soccer league in Australia and New Zealand and the highest level of the Australian soccer league system. Established in 2004 as the A-League by the ...

and the various regional and city-based leagues across Queensland. Sunshine Coast found instant success in the new competition as the club managed to win the inaugural Queensland State League Grand Final by defeating the

Brisbane Strikers Brisbane Strikers Football Club is an Australian semi-professional football club based in Brisbane, Queensland. Founded in 1991 as Brisbane United, the club competed in the National Soccer League until the 2003–04 season. Brisbane Strikers ...

1–0 through a goal from Bryan Gilfillan. However, after a run of injuries and difficulty in getting permits for foreign players, the Fire had a less successful season in 2009, finishing 3rd out of 11 teams after 20 games, ending on 41 points. In 2010 the club again captured the Premiership and Championship. Former head coach Richard Hudson led the Fire to the 2012 QSL Grand Final where they would capture the final Championship before the new

National Premier League The Jamaica Premier League (formerly the National Premier League), commonly abbreviated as JPL and officially known as the Wray and Nephew Jamaica Premier League for sponsorship reasons, is sanctioned by the Jamaican Football Federation as the ...

Kevin Aherne-Evans Kevin Aherne-Evans (born 16 December 1980) is a Welsh football coach and former professional footballer. During his playing career, he made 32 appearances in the Football League for Cardiff City and Swansea City before playing in the Welsh Premi ...

took over from Richard Hudson as head coach for the 2013 and 2014 NPL Queensland seasons, before being replaced in 2015 by

Paul Arnison Paul Simon Arnison (born 18 September 1977) is an English former footballer who played as a defensive midfielder. He last played for National Premier League Queensland club Sunshine Coast FC, where he was also employed as a coach. He is a forme ...

. In 2016 the club's form began to drop with an 11th-place finish followed by last place finishes in 2017 & 2018. Midway through the 2018 season the club replaced former head coach Ali Demircam with QSL winner Richard Hudson who returned to the club after a 6-year hiatus. Richard resigned due to personal injury at the beginning of the 2019 season. Former Caulfield City player Mitch Cattermole and Gary Newcome were installed as coaches for the season. The club were relegated at the end of the 2019 NPL season to the FQPL (Football Queensland Premier League). In September 2019, the club appointed Scottish-born Gareth Thomson as head coach.

Home ground

Sunshine Coast's playing ground is currently the Kawana Western Fields. The club share their ground with local league side Kawana Football Club.

Current squad

2020 FQPL squad as of March 2020.

Coaching staff

Senior staff at the club for the 2020 season:

Honours

* Queensland State League **Premiership (3): 2008, 2010, 2011 **Championship (4): 2008, 2010, 2011, 2012

References

External links

Sunshine Coast FC Official Website

Queensland State League

Football Queensland

National Premier League
{{AUS fb state Qld National Premier Leagues clubs Football Queensland Premier League Queensland State League soccer teams Association football clubs established in 2007 Sport in the Sunshine Coast, Queensland 2007 establishments in Australia