Playing rugby
In recent times we have experienced a resurgence of interest in rugby at mini level. This, we believe, has come about for a couple of reasons: England winning the World Cup in November 2003, the efforts the club has made to recruit more players and the success we are enjoying on the field. Having more players brings more problems: first we need to make sure we have enough coaching staff (so we recruit more, and pay for them to be trained), and second we need to make sure all the players get involved in training and match play.
There are four types of playing occasions for mini players:
-
Training, whether at home or away with another club.
-
Friendly matches, whether a Kent-arranged Structured Development Day or a club-arranged set of matches at home or away.
-
Our own Foxbury Festival
-
Away festivals, including the Kent Festival
In the first two our philosophy is to give every player who turns up a game. No teams should be selected prior to the day (in other words no player should be told not to show) and efforts will be made to give all players equal playing time.
In the event of the Foxbury Festival we will select a team to give as many players as possible a good game. Where we have large squads, it may be necessary to apply a criterion such as whether players have turned up to training, or how long they have played for the club to be selected for the Festival squad. In this, the head coach for the age-group has the major say, but any gripes will be dealt with fairly.
The last opportunity to play, 'other' festivals, gives us a chance to go for a win. The teams will be pre-selected and players informed of whether they are playing; we recognise that it is equally as important to inform those who are not selected. There is a chance that a player selected in the squad will not get much of a game, but the nature of festivals usually means that all players will be used.
We believe that this philosophy is the fairest way to balance playing all players and winning every game. Sometimes players will need to be told why we are doing this - after all, they all want to win and we shouldn't curb that instinct.Training starts on Sundays at 10.30 and lasts until about 12.30. Players should turn up suitably clad (i.e. depending on weather conditions) and be ready to start at 10.30.
