The Woodbridge Cup gets underway this weekend, with the Eugowra Golden Eagles to open their 2026 campaign at home at Ian Walsh Football Field.

The Eagles will host Blayney in round one, marking the first competitive outing for new first grade coaching combination Tongia Fox and Aaron Wykamp, after an early and strong pre‑season.

Training began well ahead of schedule and Fox believes the work put in over recent months will be evident once the competition kicks off.

“It's been good - it's been really good,” Fox said.

“I’m pretty confident in the lads that we'll be fairly strong this year, looking forward to our first game against Blayney this week.”

Sunday’s clash shapes as a solid early test for Eugowra, with Blayney understood to have recruited well and also committed to an intensive pre‑season.

“I think everyone’s pretty excited, the boys are chewing at the bit to get into some footy,” Fox said.

The Eagles have retained a strong core of last season’s squad, including 2025 best and fairest Mitch Davis, damaging back‑rower Jourdain Girot‑Serplet, the versatile Noah Girot‑Serplet, and promising young half Preston Thorpe.

They are also boosted by the addition of Tikoko Noke, who will be familiar to rugby union followers through his time at Forbes Platypi, while Will Fonohema and middle forward Ratu Tilly both return to the club.

Toby Tanks, the Eagles’ top point scorer last season, is back for another campaign, as is prolific goal‑kicker Jared Carty.

Fox says the side's size and physical presence is one of its strengths, but not the only one.

"With our halves and our hookers, they've been there for the last few years so they've got great combinations," he said.

"Kristian Markwort came into the side, slotted into fullback and he's been training really well there."

Fox, who brings representative experience from Riverina and Western to the role as well as more recent competition with Forbes Magpies, is looking forward to the Woodbridge Cup.

Plenty of the competition's talent was on show in the recent Indigenous vs Heritage competition, which he travelled to watch.

"I reckon it'll be an exciting comp," Fox said.

For the Eagles, it all kicks off at Eugowra's Ian Walsh football field this weekend.