By Griff
April 8 2005

Contrary to popular belief London Irish will be represented at the Powergen Cup on April 16th 2005. Although the first team failed to get past Leeds in the semi-final in March there will still be a patch of Twickenham that is green (albeit with a hint of blue)...

London Irish Rugby's community program this year included a massive effort to push into the local schools. Each of the participating schools in Reading, and Bracknell recieved equipment and training from London Irish and the event sponsor Powergen. The culmination of the effort was a tag rugby tournament in each of the areas with the winners facing each other at the Madejski stadium.

Winners from the Bracknell group, in a tournament run brillantly at Bracknell Rugby Club, were Warfield C of E Primary school's 'A' team The Warfield Wanderers (their 'B' team the Warratahs came third). As many may already know this school is where regular poster Andrea (the wonderful person I'm proud to call my wife) is headteacher. She started the school playing more sport from her first day there as a means to improving the school spirit and boosting the children's confidence. As a part of this her first love, Rugby, was introduced as part of the program and she took on the role of coach.

The prize for winning the event was to play at the Madejski against the winners of the Reading tournament before the Sale game in February. Their opponents, Shinfield St Mary's, had known form (they had won last year's event),international coaching (their coach, Brian Prebble, represented NZ at touch rugby) and home advantage in their favour but The Wanderers didn't let this get to them. In a close, exciting match Warfield came away victors 9 tries to 7.

It was a great event and shows why community programmes are a great idea in building a supporter base. Warfield took 40 people to the Madejski that day, and despite our loss to Sale, they had a marvellous day out. The kids latched onto young Master Armitage as their hero and screamed for him every time he got near the ball. The school is now London Irish mad.

Now the team get to realise a dream, they play on Powergen Final day at Twickenham. They will be representing London Irish against their London Wasps counterparts in an exhibition match during half-time in the Shield final between Bedford Blues and Plymouth Albion. The children, parents and staff are all very excited at the prospect and have arranged a coach to get them there and back. Jacqui and Mick Bardon parents to one of the team, Daniel, summed it up, "The day can't come round quick enough we are very proud of the team and their coach Mrs Griffiths, and just wish them a great day...they all truly deserve it!".

If you are going along to the event then don't forget to watch the exhibition at around 12:45, it is always an exciting game with plenty of tries. Warfield really does have some talented rugby players of the future and the players and supporters are a great bunch.

Andrea and the school would like to express their gratitude to all the people involved in the community programme especially Mark Tirrell, David Law and Matt Allen for their fantastic work in helping the children fulfill their potential.