If a man’s home is his castle, then a club must surely be his kingdom. 

The Parkes Spacemen certainly think so, and on Saturday treated a couple of their old boys like royalty.

Al Jones, the grand father of current players Sam Dwyer, Joey Dwyer and Bailey Jones, and Laurie Wakefield were surprised by up to 20 Spacies players, across all grades including juniors, who helped with garden maintenance, plumbing and even fixed an air-conditioning unit, all the work completed after the club’s second pre-season training run at Jock Colley Field.

Both Jones and Wakefield are former Spacemen captain-coaches and, despite ill-health, still attend the club’s home games.

Parkes president Joe Spicer said the club was keen to help out those who’ve essentially made the club what it is today – a giant of Group 11 and Western Division.

“Being quite a young club (player-wise), we don’t have heap of veterans. It’s good to instill these type of values in them, giving back,” Spicer said.

Spicer added Parkes was in a good place heading into 2019 and after news of the cancer battle Wellington star Justin Toomey-White faces leading into next season the new Spacemen president knew it was time his players gave a bit back to the community.

The club also attended the fundraiser for Toomey-White on Saturday night, a gala event that helped raise $100,000 for the Cowboys co-coach and his family.

“We came up with the idea before we heard about Justin but we thought while we’re going well it’s probably a good time to help out others,” Spicer said.

“We’ll do plenty more of it. It was well received by the old boys and the best thing about it is 15 or so players who couldn’t be there messaged me saying they were keen to help out next time.”

Parkes has another training run on Saturday, which will be the first new coach Brent Wood will attend.

The club will then break to enjoy the festive season.

“And then we’ll look to kick-off again come Australia Day,” Spicer said.