By Barney Burnham
September 26 2005

The Wasps A team will break new ground tonight when they face Bath, at Henley. It’s their first game in their new A league home. Manager Geoff Strange has been telling Barney Burnham about the move to the town on the Thames.
After defeats at Harlequins and Gloucester, last year’s southern champions hope to get back to winning ways...

GS: There are good reasons for moving to Henley, although we were very comfortable at Imber Court. The whole point of Henley is that it’s our catchment area. It’s only about ten miles from High Wycombe and if you regard Bucks, Berks. and Oxfordshire as our heartland, then it’s natural to come to a place like Henley, with whom we already have close links, to play our midweek rugby.

The facilities are excellent and there is the potential to really build up the support. We had good support at Imber Court, but it was still only around 500 to 600 people for every game. One of the things we’re hoping here is that we could perhaps start with a thousand and go from there.

We have a contract to play here for five years and we have to develop it to the point where it becomes profitable as well as making it become a home, where the players feel comfortable and really feel that they’re running out on to a home pitch.

BB: Does this also mean that Henley will become a sort of ‘feeder’ club for Wasps?

GS: Last year, we tried to work with them, but it didn’t fully work, for several reasons, and I don’t want to go into them now. It’s very difficult to work with a club who are a couple of divisions below you. There are limitations on the number of players they can put out, but also, the senior club can be seen as something of a lifeline, and we can’t really be that. We’re not in the position to help Henley get up a division. Unfortunately, they were relegated last season, and they’ve had a difficult start to this one. What we have to do is help build up the social side. Make no mistake, Henley is still a big club. They’re well established and well known, with excellent facilities. In fact, the facilities are so good that, last year, Warren Gatland was quite prepared to bring the first team down here to train. On top of that, the pitch is superb.

As I say, our objectives are to develop the Wasps environment in this area. Hopefully, regular Henley supporters will also become Wasps supporters. As long as we don’t burn our boats by putting too much on the gate, people will be encouraged to come along. We’re right on the edge of a town with around 80 thousand people, if you take in the surrounding area. A lot of people enjoy coming out to watch a game of rugby and hopefully that’ll work to the benefit of both Wasps and Henley.

BB: Let’s look at the immediate prospect of the match against Bath. The A squad has rather an injury crisis at the moment. Are we going to struggle to raise a team, as was the case against Gloucester?

GS: No, we will have a team. Hopefully, it’ll be a bit stronger. I did in fact discuss with Ian and the coaches about whether we should delay the game, but we decided that we’d given it such a local buildup that we had to go ahead.

The game at Gloucester was almost top-heavy with non-Wasps, but the Bath game will be a different matter. We have two or three players returning from injury. It’s difficult at the moment, but we have to make a go of it.