Barlow Park is a multi-sports facility and stadium in Parramatta Park,

Cairns Cairns (; ) is a city in the Cairns Region, Queensland, Australia, on the tropical north east coast of Far North Queensland. In the , Cairns had a population of 153,181 people. The city was founded in 1876 and named after William Cairns, Sir W ...

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 ...

, Australia. The Park is home of the

Northern Pride RLFC Northern Pride Rugby League Football Club is a semi-professional Queensland rugby league club based in Cairns. Founded in 2007 they represent Far North Queensland, and compete in Queensland's top rugby league competition, Queensland Rugby Leag ...

offices, Cairns District Rugby Union, Cairns and District Athletics Association, Australian Sports Commission Development, Oztag, and formerly

Cairns FC Cairns FC, previously known as FNQ FC Heat, was an Australian semi-professional soccer club based in the regional city of Cairns, in the far north of Queensland. Founded in 2012, the club was awarded a licence to compete in the National Premi ...

and

Cairns District Rugby League The Cairns District Rugby League was formed on 5 August 1918 and is the administrative body for the game of rugby league football in Cairns, Queensland. The CDRL runs senior, junior and women's club competitions and has its headquarters at Barl ...

. Since 2008 it has been the home ground for the Northern Pride rugby league team who play in the State Competition

Queensland Cup The Queensland Cup, currently known as the Hostplus Cup for sponsorship reasons, is the highest-level regional rugby league, rugby league football competition in Queensland, Australia. It is run by the Queensland Rugby League, Queensland Rugby ...

. utters duo in North QLD showdownhttps://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/mackay/sport/cutters-duo-in-north-qld-showdown/news-story/4e42c1f5c314e650f92a37ffc98a7548)

Venue

The ground comprises an

IAAF World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation and International Association of Athletics Federations and formerly abbreviated as the IAAF, is the international sports governing body, governing body for the sport ...

international athletics facility, turf sports fields at the main Barlow and West Barlow parks, and a capacity of 15,000 people including a 1,700 seat grandstand with corporate and media facilities.

History

The Cairns Sports Centre (Barlow Park) was officially opened on Saturday the 5th of December 1987. It was named after James Aloysius Barlow, an alderman with Cairns City Council from 1955-1970. It has had various upgrades, notably a $1 million grandstand extension which was officially opened on 13 August 2003. In 2024 a $10.9 million project installed LED lighting which increased the lighting capacity from 500 lux to broadcast standard 1800 lux and also installed a large video screen for scoring and replays. ew lighting first step in Olympics upgrade for Barlow Parkhttps://www.austadiums.com/news/1192/new-lighting-first-step-in-olympics-upgrade-for-barlow-park) Further upgrades are proposed to enable the venue to be used for preliminary football matches for the 2032 Olympic games. Prior to the development of the sporting complex, Barlow Park was a cricket ground, and in 1978 hosted a match between the

West Indies The West Indies is an island subregion of the Americas, surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, which comprises 13 independent island country, island countries and 19 dependent territory, dependencies in thr ...

and Cavaliers XI.

Events

Barlow Park has hosted athletic events,

rugby union Rugby union football, commonly known simply as rugby union in English-speaking countries and rugby 15/XV in non-English-speaking world, Anglophone Europe, or often just rugby, is a Contact sport#Terminology, close-contact team sport that orig ...

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 ...

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as rugby league in English-speaking countries and rugby 13/XIII in non-Anglophone Europe, is a contact sport, full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular Rugby league playin ...

matches and music concerts, including

Midnight Oil Midnight Oil (known informally as "The Oils") are an Australian rock band composed of Peter Garrett (vocals, harmonica), Rob Hirst (drums), Jim Moginie (guitar, keyboard) and Martin Rotsey (guitar). The group was formed in Sydney in 1972 by H ...

(1997),

Killing Heidi Killing Heidi are an Australian rock band, formed in Violet Town, Victoria in 1996, initially as a folk-pop duo by siblings Ella and Jesse Hooper. The band has released three studio albums: '' Reflector'' (March 2000), which reached No.&nb ...

(2000) and two

John Farnham John Peter Farnham (born 1 July 1949) is a British-born Australian singer. Farnham was a teen pop idol from 1967 until the mid-1970s, billed as Johnny Farnham. He has since forged a career as an adult contemporary singer.McFarlane (1999). Enc ...

concerts (2003).

Athletics

The Oceania Area Championships have been held at Barlow Park in 2007, 2010, 2012 and 2015. These events attracted athletes from around the world compete, as well as international sports people such as Sir Sebastian Coe. The venue also hosted the 2018 Australian All School Athletics Championships.

Rugby Union

Cairns District Rugby Union

CDRU play matches at Barlow Park.

Queensland Rugby Union

Super Rugby

There have been three

Super Rugby Super Rugby is a men's professional rugby union club competition involving teams from Australia, Fiji, New Zealand, and the Pacific Islands. It has previously included teams from Argentina, Japan, and South Africa. Super Rugby started as the S ...

pre-season trial games at Barlow Park.

International Rugby Union Games

On 21 June 1989 Queensland B played the British Lions during their tour to Australia.

Soccer

National Premier Leagues Queensland

The FNQ FC Heat, later Cairns FC, played their

National Premier Leagues Queensland The National Premier League Queensland (NPL Queensland or NPL QLD) is the top tier state-level soccer competition in the Australian state of Queensland. The conference, run by Football Queensland, is a sub division of the National Premier Leagues ...

home games at Barlow Park between 2012-2018.

FAA Cup

Four

FFA Cup The Australia Cup (currently known as the Hahn Australia Cup for sponsorship reasons) is the national soccer knockout cup competition in Australia. This annual competition is organised by Football Australia (known as Football Federation Austra ...

matches have been held at Barlow Park.

A-League

Two A-League Pre-Season Challenge Cup matches have been played at Barlow Park.

Rugby League

Cairns District Rugby League

The

CDRL In United States military contracts, the contract data requirements list (CDRL, pronounced ''SEE-drill'') is a list of authorized data requirements for a specific procurement that forms a part of the contract. Overview The CDRL identifies what dat ...

play their grand final at Barlow Park. Prior to the development of Barlow Park in the 1980s,

and

Foley Shield The Foley Shield is a rugby league competition in North Queensland administered by the Queensland Rugby League. Prior to 1948 an inter-town competition known as the Carlton Cup was contested in North Queensland. This was revamped, and renamed ...

rugby league games were played at Parramatta Park (now the Cairns Showgrounds).

Queensland Cup

The Cairns Cyclones Rugby League Football Club played 32 home games at Barlow Park between 1996 and 2000. Since their inception in 2008, the Northern Pride Rugby League Football Club have played their

home games at Barlow Park. Average crowds were around 2,300, with attendances over 4,000 for matches against the

PNG Hunters The Papua New Guinea Hunters (also referred to as PNG Hunters) are a professional rugby league football club based in Papua New Guinea. They were formed in December 2013 and compete in the Queensland Cup, a second tier competition in Australia. ...

NRL Pre-Season Trials

The

North Queensland Cowboys The North Queensland Cowboys is an Australian professional rugby league football club based in Townsville, the largest city in North Queensland. They compete in Australia's premier rugby league competition, the National Rugby League (NRL). Sinc ...

have played more than a dozen

NRL The National Rugby League (also known as the NRL Telstra Premiership for sponsorship reasons) is a professional rugby league competition in Oceania which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria (state), Victoria, the Austral ...

pre-season trial matches. The record attendance at the venue was set at the 2004

Cowboys A cowboy is a professional pastoralist or mounted livestock herder, usually from the Americas or Australia. Cowboy(s) or The Cowboy(s) may also refer to: Film and television * ''Cowboy'' (1958 film), starring Glenn Ford * ''Cowboy'' (1966 film), ...

v Sea Eagles trial which attracted a crowd of 20,000. {{table alignment {, class="wikitable defaultright col3center col4left" style="bgcolor=#bdb76b; font-size:85%;" , - ! Date !! Home Team !! Score !! Away Team !! Attendance , - , 28 February 2003 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 24{{sndash30 , , {{leagueicon, Newcastle Knights, 16

Newcastle Knights The Newcastle Knights are an Australian professional rugby league team based in Newcastle, New South Wales that competes in the National Rugby League (NRL) premiership. Playing in red and blue, the Knights joined the top-tier competition in New ...

, , 11,200 , - , 20 February 2004 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 22{{sndash22 , , {{leagueicon, Manly Sea Eagles, 16

Manly Warringah Sea Eagles The Manly Warringah Sea Eagles are an Australian professional rugby league club based in Sydney's Northern Beaches. They compete in the National Rugby League (NRL). The Manly club debuted in the 1947 New South Wales Rugby Football League seaso ...

, , 19,950 , - , 25 February 2005 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 18{{sndash30 , , {{leagueicon, Melbourne Storm, 16

Melbourne Storm The Melbourne Storm is a rugby league football club based in Melbourne, Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia that participates in the National Rugby League (NRL). The club plays its home games at AAMI Park, and wears a purple and navy blu ...

, , 17,000 , - , 18 February 2006 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 26{{sndash10 , , {{leagueicon, Auckland, 16

New Zealand Warriors The Warriors are a professional rugby league football club based in Auckland, New Zealand that competes in the National Rugby League (NRL) premiership and is the League's only team from outside Australia. They were formed in 1995 as the Aucklan ...

, , 15,000 , - , 3 March 2007 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 12{{sndash24 , , {{leagueicon, Manly Sea Eagles, 16

, , 12,500 , - , 23 February 2008 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 22{{sndash30 , , {{leagueicon, Gold Coast Titans, 16

Gold Coast Titans The Gold Coast Titans are a professional rugby league football club, based on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia. The club competes in the National Rugby League (NRL) premiership, Australia's elite rugby league competition. Since 2008, the ...

, , , - , 28 February 2009 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 18{{sndash18 , , {{leagueicon, Penrith Panthers, 16

Penrith Panthers The Penrith Panthers are an Australian professional rugby league football club based in the Greater Western Sydney suburb of Penrith, New South Wales, Penrith that competes in the National Rugby League (NRL). The team is based west of the cen ...

, , 12,000 , - , 20 February 2010 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , {{0, 06{{sndash28 , , {{leagueicon, Auckland, 16

, , 10,000 , - , 26 February 2011 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 22{{sndash24 , , {{leagueicon, Gold Coast Titans, 16

, , , - , 16 February 2013 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 28{{sndash22 , , {{leagueicon, St. George Illawarra Dragons, 16 St. George Illawarra Dragons , , 12,036 , - , 21 February 2015 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 30{{sndash10 , , {{leagueicon, Gold Coast Titans, 16

, , , - , 17 February 2018 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 16{{sndash30 , , {{leagueicon, Wests Tigers, 16

Wests Tigers The Wests Tigers is an Australian professional rugby league football team, based in the Inner West of Sydney and South Western Sydney. The Tigers have competed in the National Rugby League (NRL) since being formed at the end of the 1999 N ...

, , , - , 22 February 2020 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 18{{sndash16 , , {{leagueicon, Brisbane Broncos, 16

Brisbane Broncos The Brisbane Broncos are an Australian professional rugby league football club based in Red Hill, a suburb of Brisbane, Queensland. Founded in April 1987, the Broncos compete in the National Rugby League (NRL) and play their home games at ...

, , , - , 19 February 2022 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 24{{sndash12 , , {{leagueicon, South Sydney Rabbitohs, 16

South Sydney Rabbitohs The South Sydney District Rugby League Football Club, also known as the South Sydney Rabbitohs, is an Australian professional rugby league football club based in the Sydney suburb of Maroubra, New South Wales, Maroubra that competes in the Nat ...

, , 7,128 , - , 12 February 2023 , , NQ Cowboys {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 , , 22{{sndash22 , , {{leagueicon, Dolphins, 16

Dolphins A dolphin is an aquatic mammal in the cetacean clade Odontoceti (toothed whale). Dolphins belong to the families Delphinidae (the oceanic dolphins), Platanistidae (the Indian river dolphins), Iniidae (the New World river dolphins), Pontopori ...

, , 8,922 , -

NRL Telstra Premiership

Seven NRL Telstra Premiership Games have been held at Barlow Park. The first was on 16 June 2013 between

and the

, which attracted a crowd of 16,118. Two other NRL Telstra Premiership matches were played in Cairns at

Cazalys Stadium Cazalys Stadium is a sports stadium in Cairns, Queensland, Australia. It is situated in the suburb of Westcourt. The stadium is named after the social club which abuts the oval, Cazalys, which itself was named after Australian rules footballer ...

in 2001.{{Cite web , title=2001 NRL Telstra Premiership - Round 10 - North Queensland Cowboys 22 lost to Northern Eagles 24 - RLP , url=https://www.rugbyleagueproject.org/seasons/nrl-2001/round-10/north-queensland-cowboys-vs-northern-eagles/summary.html , access-date=2024-07-23 , website=www.rugbyleagueproject.org {{table alignment {, class="wikitable defaultright col3center col4left" style="bgcolor=#bdb76b; font-size:85%;" , - ! Date !! Home Team !! Score !! Away Team !! Attendance , - , 16 June 2013 , ,

{{leagueicon, Souths, 16 , , 30{{sndash24 , , {{leagueicon, Gold Coast Titans, 16

, , 16,118 , - , 3 August 2014 , ,

{{leagueicon, Souths, 16 , , 50{{sndash10 , , {{leagueicon, Newcastle, 16

, , 11,578 , - , 26 April 2015 , ,

{{leagueicon, Souths, 16 , , 22{{sndash30 , , {{leagueicon, Canberra, 16

Canberra Raiders The Canberra Raiders are an Australian professional rugby league football club based in the national capital city of Canberra, Australian Capital Territory. They have competed in Australasia's elite rugby league competition, the National Rugb ...

, , 8,713 , - , 3 July 2016 , ,

{{leagueicon, Souths, 16 , , {{0, 00{{sndash20 , , {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 NQ Cowboys , , 14,923 , - , 16 July 2017 , ,

{{leagueicon, Souths, 16 , , 10{{sndash23 , , {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 NQ Cowboys , , 11,217 , - , 1 July 2018 , ,

{{leagueicon, Souths, 16 , , 21{{sndash20 , , {{leagueicon, Nth Qld, 16 NQ Cowboys , , 7,195 , - , 12 August 2023 , ,

{{leagueicon, Souths, 16 , , 26{{sndash14 , , {{leagueicon, St George, 16

St George Illawarra Dragons The St. George Illawarra Dragons are an Australian professional rugby league football club, representing both the Illawarra and St George regions of New South Wales. The club has competed in the National Rugby League (NRL) since 1999 after a j ...

, , 8,378

International Rugby League Games

The stadium hosted three matches in the

2017 Rugby League World Cup The 2017 Rugby League World Cup was the fifteenth staging of the Rugby League World Cup tournament and took place in Australia, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea between 27 October and 2 December 2017. The tournament featured the national teams ...

, including a double-header. Other international matches have been played, including the 1990 Les Chanticleers Tour, a trial match with New Zealand in 1994, and a qualifying match in the

2009 Pacific Cup The 2009 Pacific Cup, known as the 2009 SP Brewery Pacific Cup due to sponsorship, was a rugby league competition held in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. The competing teams were the , , , , . Tonga, Fiji and PNG had their places in the draw c ...

.{{Cite web , date=2009-10-19 , title=Cook Islands progress to Pacific Cup - NRL.com , url=http://www.nrl.com/newsviews/latestnews/newsarticle/tabid/10874/newsid/57129/cook-islands-progress-to-pacific-cup/default.aspx , access-date=2024-07-23 , archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091019115213/http://www.nrl.com/newsviews/latestnews/newsarticle/tabid/10874/newsid/57129/cook-islands-progress-to-pacific-cup/default.aspx , archive-date=19 October 2009 {{table alignment {, class="wikitable defaultright col3center col4left" style="bgcolor=#bdb76b; font-size:85%;" , - ! Date !! Home Team !! Score !! Away Team !! Attendance , - , 14 June 1990 , , QLD Country {{leagueicon, Queensland, 16 , , {{0, 09{{sndash16 , , {{flagicon, FRA France Chanticleers , , 5,000 , - , 23 October 1999 , , Cairns Aborigines {{leagueicon, Australia, 16 , , 32{{sndash10 , , {{rl, PNG , , 5,200 , - , 17 October 2009 , , Cook Islands Aitu, Kuki's {{flagicon, Cook Islands , , 22{{sndash20 , , {{flagicon, SAM Toa Samoa , , 4,261 , - , 29 October 2017 , ,

Ireland Wolfhounds The Ireland Wolfhounds (also known as Ireland A and Ireland B) are the second national rugby union team of Ireland, behind the Ireland national team. History The Wolfounds previously competed in the Churchill Cup together with the England Sax ...

{{flagicon, IRE, rugby league , , 36{{sndash12 , , {{flagicon, ITA Italy Azzurri , , 9,216 , - , 29 October 2017 , , Mate Ma'a Tonga {{flagicon, TON , , 50{{sndash4{{0, 0 , , {{flagicon, SCO Scotland Bravehearts , , 9,216 , - , 11 November 2017 , , Toa Samoa {{flagicon, SAM , , 14{{sndash12 , , {{flagicon, SCO Scotland Bravehearts , , 4,309 , -

References

{{Reflist

External links

Barlow Park
at Austadiums
Barlow Park
''rleague.com''

''cricinfo.com'' {{Northern Pride {{NRL Grounds {{2017 RLWC venues {{Olympic venues football Rugby league stadiums in Australia Rugby union stadiums in Australia Cricket grounds in Queensland Athletics (track and field) venues in Australia Northern Pride RLFC Venues of the 2032 Summer Olympics Sport in Cairns Sports venues in Queensland Cairns FC Buildings and structures in Cairns Rugby union in Queensland Rugby league in Queensland Sports venues completed in 1987 1987 establishments in Australia Defunct cricket grounds in Australia