Students Rugby
Salford Uni’s Carol is dream rugby recruit
Tony Simpson
When Carol Amoako-Adofo arrived at the University of Salford last year, she had no experience of rugby union, other than a vague belief that pace and agression were valuable components. Yet such has been the enthusiasm and learning capacity of the 20-year-old Ghanaian student that she has not only graduated into a more than competent player, but she has also added a string of coaching and teaching qualifications to her fund of rugby knowledge. When RFU Development personnel and university rugby club workers attend Freshers’ Fayres hoping to attract new recruits they dream of people like Carol, who decided when she arrived at their stand that rugby might have something to offer.
“I had done athletics, but having been involved in an individual sport, I wanted to try a team game,” she says. “I thought that my speed and aggression might be suited to rugby and that’s how it has worked out. I’ve enjoyed it even more than I expected. It’s been great. “The coaching side of the game has also worked out well with my studies. I like working with other freshers on their rugby skills and also with children. I’m doing some work with the younger playersat Ashton-on-Mersey RFC. It’s a bit scary at first when you are putting a session together and delivering it to the kids, but I’ve been watching other coaches in action and hopefully have learned something from them. Since I became involved as a volunteer on the coaching side, everyone has been very helpful.”
Carol has immersed herself in the game, not only enjoying being part of the University team, but also expanding her horizons into coaching at club and school levels. She attended a number of the Development Days organised in Manchester for new female players during the five-week period between the start of term and the new season beginning. She attended a Rugby Ready and Level One course organised across the three Greater Manchester Universities, passed both with flying colours and has been CRB checked allowing her to assist with coaching sessions. “Playing wise, she is helping Salford University to battle for honours at the top of the table, but she has also completed the disciplines and checks to enable her to become involved in coaching.” says Chris Townsend, the Manchester RFU Student Liaison Officer. “Carol has now been accepted onto the Trafford Leisure’s Volunteer Programme and will be working in local disability schools as she looks to complete her degree in Exercise, Physical Activity and Health. She will use the placement to formulate her final year’s project.
“Recently she started work with Ashton on Mersey Rugby Club, where the support of Janet Attenborough and Community Rugby Coach Jason Duffy has laid the foundations for her to get involved. Carol really is a classic example of someone from outside rugby taking to it like a duck to water and making real strides in a short space of time. The fact that she has been able to add a completely new dimension of work and play to her life as a student is something lots of students, both men and women, could consider.”
Student coaches Make their Mark on Merseyside
Tony Simpson
Youngsters getting away to a flying start on Merseyside
THE NORTH West Rugby Union Development Team - and the Student Liaison Officers in particular - has made a concerted effort to provide more opportunities for students to develop their coaching skills, both within universities and in the wider community. In the Liverpool area, SLO John Livesey recruited five students to assist with the coaching at the three local universities, Liverpool, Liverpool John Moores, and Liverpool Hope, to support the retention programme following on from the Freshers Fairs. This initiative was instrumental in delivering coaching sessions and festivals for women and the creation of two ‘development’ teams. One student coach is Chris Thompson a Ph.D student at Liverpool University, who coaches the women’s team and organises the Intra Mural League.
Community rugby has also benefited from student input. Eight students from the Warrington Campus (Chester University) contributed to a North West U15 coaching day and are doing 40 hours coaching in the Rugby Development Team programme. Six students from Liverpool Hope University helped to deliver a rugby programme for children with learning difficulties in November. Three of the students also do some coaching at their local clubs, including the club captain Stuart Gratton, who coaches the University team and has done additional voluntary coaching in a local primary school.
A number of students from Liverpool John Moores (LJM) have been actively coaching in the community for some time. Ian Evans and Dan King, who gained their coaching qualifications a year or more ago, assist the Liverpool Rugby Development Officer Andrew Soutar in running the Liverpool Rugby Academy and in other projects, such as tag-rugby programmes in schools. The Academy is for children across the city to help guide them to rugby clubs. Ian and Dan were also very much involved in an open day to create a new Junior Club at Mossley Hill RUFC, which was hugely successful.
A very well attended Level 1 Award course was held in Liverpool at the beginning of February with students attending from Warrington Campus, Hope University and LJM University. Of the 28 candidates, 15 were already involved in, or had experience of, coaching and a further six volunteered to help coach mini and junior rugby at local rugby clubs.
