By SoS Committee
September 11 2004

After what turned out to be a very close race, the second ever 'Craic Supporter of the Season' award goes to one of the nicest people you could hope to meet, Robin Clive, better known to us as OxonRob.

Supporter of the Season 2003/4

Robin Clive
(OxonRob)

So good a friend do I feel Robin Clive to be now, it seems strange to recall that it was less than three years ago we first met. On the then Rivals board a group of us had arranged to meet in JC's before the first game of the season. It was some time after that before we next met, at Twickenham on Powergen Cup Final day.

Rob started supporting London Irish back in the mid eighties, a convert from London Welsh. In the intervening years this Englishman with Welsh roots has become the epitome of all that is special about London Irish supporters.

Rob works from his Dorchester home as a Writer and Creative Director. Amongst other things, in his earlier working life he has written sketches for Monty Python and advertisements for Guinness. His work also took him to South Africa for some years where he headed up an advertising agency. His talent as a writer shows through on the messageboard on many occasions. Most notably this was when he led a diatribe about the misuse of apostrophes. Almost two years on from this I'm still wary of when I use them. He also coined the strap line 'London Irish is a State of Mind', this is now firmly established in London Irish supporters' lore.

Rob was nominated for Craic Supporter of the Season in 2002/3 and came second in the voting. That season he had launched the JC Joke Book, raising a tidy sum for the Jarrod Cunningham Salsa Foundation in the process. I have an abiding picture in my head of Rob in many places and in all weathers selling this book to an unsuspecting public. His tireless work, both last season and this, on the Henley barbeque has ensured its success.

Quite simply Rob is one of the nicest people I know. Rarely seen without a smile on his face, his natural warmth and good humour endear him to those who come to know him. Rob is a natural conciliator, always seeing the other person’s point of view and being prepared to argue that persons case at times even if he does not hold that viewpoint himself. On the messageboard I have on occasion labeled Rob a 'Shoite stirrer', never is my tongue more firmly in my cheek than when I do so.

Rob, from your fellow supporters, hearty congratulations on being voted Craic Supporter of the Season 2003/4. You, and indeed all your fellow nominees, are a credit to this wonderful club we support.

Other 2003/4 Nominees

Peter Earnshaw
Bill Newton
Claire Gosney
Marie Hilliard
Paul Looby

Craic Supporter of the Season 2003/4 Nomination Committee: Brian Campbell, Graeme Griffiths, Paul Warrender, Chris Tampsett.