The Cannonballs were awarded the Steve Taylor Memorial Spirit of Rugby award, which is given to the club that upholds outstanding principles on and off the field.

Club president, Brad Taylor said the award was very special because it speaks volumes on what they are about as a group.

"It's a big one for us, we've always tabbed ourselves as a family oriented club, very inclusive and also trying to get as many people involved," He said.

"I spoke to some of our players, they were very excited and happy with the award."

The Cannonballs were used as an example on how to respect referees, after they announced zero tolerance rule on violence towards match officials.

Mr Taylor said the club had to come a long way since the start of the season, after thinking they weren't going to be able to field a full men's team.

"We were in dire straits there for a bit, there was five of us from the committee and coaching staff on a Tuesday night, a fortnight before we played, and there was eight seniors at training," Mr Taylor said.

They reached out to the community in a last ditch effort.

"We put the shoutout on our Facebook page, we tasked our more senior members of the club to make a call out, we guilted a few of the older heads to play again, and before you knew it we had a team up and running, and we had enough for two teams," Mr Taylor said.

After solving the numbers issue, the club had no problem fronting up every week, with some outstanding results all round.

Both the men's reserve grade and the under 18's were awarded the minor premiership, and multiple other teams had made it through to the finals, before the season was cut short due to COVID.

Mr Taylor said it was a shame that the season ended abruptly, but he's happy with the results from each team.

"You can almost thank everyone involved in rugby in Kempsey," he said.

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