Willows Sports Complex
stadium in Townsville, Queensland, Australia
The Willows Sports Complex was a grass football stadium situated in Townsville, Queensland, Australia. It was used predominantly as a rugby league ground as the home ground of the North Queensland Cowboys National Rugby League club. The ground was also used for rugby union and soccer. From 2009 to 2011, A-League football club North Queensland Fury called it home.
Since inception as a rugby league ground, the ground had several sponsored naming rights: Stockland Stadium (1995–97), Malanda Stadium (1998) Dairy Farmers Stadium (1999–2013) and 1300SMILES Stadium (2013–2019). The last NRL match to be played at the stadium was on Thursday 29 August 2019 between the North Queensland Cowboys and Canterbury Bankstown Bulldogs.
History
Willows Sporting Complex
Prior to 1995, the stadium site was occupied by the Willows Sporting Complex. It hosted trotting paceway nights, and was the main pacing venue for the Townsville District. With the admission of the North Queensland Cowboys to the Australian Rugby League competition in 1995, the Willows site was transformed into a basic rugby league venue with a western grandstand as well as eastern side terraces. The northern and southern ends had sloped grass hills.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 31, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3012162. Authority coordinates are -19.316, 146.712. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2009, 2011, 1995 and 1998.
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This entry incorporates text from “Willows Sports Complex” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.