LAST night the Coffs Harbour Comets excitedly announced at its Annual General Meeting that Brandon Costin is returning as the club and first grade coach in 2021.

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Costin led the Comets to a glorious Group 2 grand final victory in 2018 before taking up a position as the head coach of the Fijian national team.

He’s returned to Coffs Harbour to spend more time with family and said being offered the role at the Comets again by club president Steve Gooley was an opportunity he jumped at.

“Once I got my head around being here for the next five or six years, Steve said ‘surely you’re not going anywhere but your local, home grown club’,” Costin said.

“I said I’m more than happy to help out.”

Costin’s rugby league resume makes him an obvious candidate to be the club’s head coach.

Eight years of playing in the NRL with South Sydney, Wests, Easts and Canberra followed by a further four years playing in the English Super League gave the 48 year-old an enormous amount of football knowledge.

As well as coaching Fiji, Costin has been an assistant coach for the Roosters as well as coaching in the Queensland Cup for six years.

Gooley said it’s fantastic to have such a highly regarded person back at the club.

“Brandon is also going to play a major role in the development of our Comets juniors,” Gooley said.

“2021 will see the fruits of a lot of hard work at the Comets come to fruition in that this year’s strong under-16’s and under-15’s are coming through the ranks and will be playing under 18’s.

“We have a lot of young juniors coming through our club and a lot of those boys are looking to play first grade.

“When they found out that they can be coached by an ex NRL player and coach and the immediate past Fiji national coach they were very excited. A lot of them have heard stories from the 2018 team of how good a coach he is and how much they learned from ‘Costo’.”

By Brad GREENSHIELDS