Here it is, the Stoneham RFC blog, my chance to vent, rant weekly on all things rugby and also offer another platform to get the good word out about our club. So we are in to June and, my captaincy is 1 month old. so far things are going well, at least i think they are, attendance at training has been good, our new coach is developing new stratagies and new game plans for us to work to. and so far the team has taken to it well. but some things are playing on my mind. The season seems so far away and yet in relative terms it really is not, we are almost to July giving us 8 weeks until our first match. the things on my mind are these:
Sponsorship:
So far we have no sponsor, we have no external money coming in of any kind, at this rate we will be recycling last years shirts for this year and to me that is unacceptable. I am trying to create a professional atmosphere within the club, i want Stoneham to share the success that in my years of playing rugby i have done, i have been involved in league winning clubs, clubs who have won cups, clubs that strived for the victory. I want Stoneham to feel like that share the elation one gets when your team, your friends do well! Part of that is to look like a team, look like the you belong on the paddock. But we need someone to come along to inject the much needed cash into the club in order to do this. Times are tough, i know this, the club knows this, but is it really that tough. The benefits surely outweigh the costs.
Stoneham runs as a purely voluntary club, without those who work tirelessly to keep the club running we would have folded as a club years ago. But we show the determination off the field we do on it! Stoneham have shown a determined spirit on the field, the likes of which i have never seen before, we just need the backing to maintain the club and keep us going forward.
Recruitment:
Pre-season, a time to reassess, a time to evaluate what worked last season and what didn't, a time to remedy and improve. But, can a club do this with the players it has, i look around at local clubs that have basked in glory and the deeper i look the more i see how they won leagues, cups and play-offs. One such club who gained promotion did so by recruitment, at the end of 2009/2010 season the club the club scouted discontented players from bigger clubs and essentially hand picked a team through incentives. This is indicative of amateur Rugby in the south, the big clubs snap up the talent and attempt to buy promotion, its all about glory, it is all about trying to get the strongest squad, even if that means many players sitting on the fringes and not getting regular game time, why do they stay? because the promise that they might get into the first team. I am of the opinion that game time makes players better, not watching as someone else takes your shirt.
So where does that leave a club like Stoneham? well, it leaves us with a core of players , glaring gaps in some positions and all because larger more successful clubs are hogging players starving the rest of the smaller clubs from potential players. what can be done? maybe it is time for some pro-active action, i have a plan to help recruit! further details on the plan in a future blog!
Training and Fitness:
Any club goes through a period where fitness is an issue. Usually it is the time spent from the end of the season to the start of pre season where fitness drops off. This is the same for any club, although, we did start last season very strongly and our fitness was above the teams that we played, leading to some very good wins. However, they soon caught up and overtook us. Last season after christmas and towards the end of the season our fitness dropped off dramatically and after a satisfying 49-13 win at home we failed to win a single league game from January to April, we did draw one, but still not a single victory. Some fantastic performances and some fantastic games, but the big W was elusive. the drop off in winning was coincided to a drop off in training.
I am determined that this will not happen again! we have a new coach and with him, new ideas, he has a clear idea of how to progress and has a style that will keep people interested. Our coach has an ethic that if training is fresh, interesting and not repetitive people will attend. This is where i went wrong last year, i attempted incorporate fitness, ball skills and neglect game plan, we lost direction. We started to repeat over and over the same drills. This season will be different. we have direction, we have purpose and we have a plan!
As for fitness, well we have a long way to go, we have a great deal of work to do in order to bring everyone up to the same level. I have instigated a separate and specific session designed to improve ball handling, strength and speed to work alongside the main training session. The first session had 5 people attend and was very intense with a high work rate. Hopefully more will attend and hopefully this will help when September comes.
Conclusions:
So here it is the first in the Captains Blog. my thoughts, concerns and areas of attention. This is designed to be a record for those within the club, but maybe it will help other players and clubs to look at it and say, yes we have that problem, or hey they sound like a good club to play for, you never know the effects of blogs, help or detriment, your comments welcomed!
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