Haverhill Rugby Football Club Ltd
Castle Playing Fields, School Lane
01440 702871
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Haverhill Rugby Football Club Ltd Castle Playing Fields, School Lane 01440 702871
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Contact Information
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Grand opening of the patio is on Saturday 26th September 09 at 1.00p.m.
President David Wilson opening the patio.
After several years of planning we have finally gone ahead with a major
upgrade to facilities at the club with the addition of a splendid patio. As well
as increasing flexibility for vitally important private functions, the new
addition will make watching rugby a much more clothes friendly activity – the
only person complaining will be your dry cleaner!
29/08/09
Abbeycroft Leisure Sports Awards 2007 Click here to access this report directly The club was founded in 1965 and played out of Castle Manor School under skipper Bill Whannell, resplendent in shirts of red and white hoops. After match entertainment was carried out in various pubs in the town. The "home" pitch became RAF Stradishall in 1970 whilst drinking out of the Woolpack under the watchful eye of Bill Clayton. For some reason, the club colours changed to maroon - well in theory anyway. The club never owned any shirts and if Morley's didn't have any in stock players BOUGHT whatever was available and played in that. Clashes with the opposition were to be avoided but the times we played in skins were numerous - not to be recommended in January but at least it made tackling harder for the opposition. From Strad, the next move was to the Chalkstone Playing fields - still in maroon. Drinking was carried out with great aplomb at the Plough along Withersfield Road. Pete Cleary was the landlord and a great time was had by all passing "Shim" off to the opposition as a great pull. No pictures are available (unless you know different!) but apparently he was a good looking bird! Still playing at the Chalkstone, we had a year at the White Hart under Dick and Erika Green. Frank (spinster of this parish) Williams was soundly beaten in the yard of ale by landlords son, ex president, ex player, ex and soon to be again, cook and bottle washer and all round good egg, Riky. (His dad couldn't spell Ricky on the Birth Certificate).
Our first permanent home was a disused council
pavilion on
castle playing fields.
We moved in during 1974 (ish) after much hard work by members and
especially the then secretary, Roger Taylor. The old "shed" was
transformed in 1975 with a proper floor - laid just in time for Christmas.
In fact the floor was laid, in a semi random fashion, by a rather inebriated
gentleman on Christmas Eve. At that time, the club ran a Father Christmas
run to raise funds (for the local Meals on Wheels) and also the club profile.
Our own kitchen became a source of much amusement with a volunteer having to feign injury at some time during the second half to go and turn the sausages - black and pink stripes were not considered appetising! Once the wives, sweethearts and local spinsters became aware of the lack of changing facilities, cooking duties were taken over by so many volunteers that the kitchen had to be expanded. What you may well ask has the lack of changing facilities got to do with getting female cooks? Well, soon it became common knowledge that the curtain dividing the clubhouse didn't meet in the middle and was also prone to collapse! Voyeurs of the world unite! A couple of years later (1982?) a Portacabin was added, along with a causeway to connect the two. Much of the work was done by teams from the Youth Training Scheme with the assistance of Henry (Mac) MacAulay. This eased the changing room situation but by now the exhibitionist nature of the players was such that female cooks were still in evidence, particularly when bar diving was the order of the day! o avoid colour clashes with Clacton, the Ankins decided that we should change shirt colours. The outcry was so loud that, to ease the situation, it was agreed that the club would PAY FOR the strip! The Claret and Blue decided upon had absolutely nothing to do with the Ankins' support of a soccer club based somewhere in East London who Ham it up on the West side of the city. (Sometime during the mid 70s, the council came up with a cunning game plan to ruin our game - they decided to spend serious money (£20K?) on draining the pitches. Fortunately the plan backfired - it appears that the contractor may have backfilled the drainage channels with clay.) Once the holes in the
causeway had become big
enough to lose a scrum half down, a new clubhouse was on the agenda. After
much fund raising, begging, borrowing and just a little misappropriation the new
clubhouse was finally opened by Dudley Wood in December 1995. detailed examination of the files of that period gives a
small insight into the prodigious amount of work done by Clive Farrow to ensure
the building project went through to completion. The
bar is the centre of the clubhouse and serves a superb pint of Adnams. The latest addition to the club grounds is the One to One tower, and provides a useful source of income.
In 2002 the council finally got around to carrying out £30K's worth of drainage work on the pitches. Scenes like that above are no more!
In October 2005, the Webb Ellis trophy visited the club on the final stage of the sweet chariot tour. Abbeycroft Leisure Sports Awards 2007 Haverhill & District RFC Club of the Year Award 2007 Sponsored by Unison The Club received nominations in two categories for this the inaugural year of the Abbeycroft Leisure Awards. The Junior Section was nominated and won, beating off strong competition from other rugby and sports clubs in West Suffolk for The Unison “Club of the Year” Award. This was awarded in recognition of the success in developing junior membership and community involvement. This award recognises the hard work and dedication of all the coaches and volunteers who give up their own time to provide the children of Haverhill & District with the opportunity to play rugby in an enjoyable and safe environment over the last three years. Paul Donovan was also nominated for the West Suffolk College “Coach of the Year” Award for his drive and motivation behind the introduction of rugby to local primary schools in the Haverhill area. Peter Lester, Hon Secretary HRFC, and Paul Donovan, Junior Coach collected the Unison “Club of the Year” Award on behalf of the Club.
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Copyright © 2006 HRFC Youth Section
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Riky Green still insists that the fact that he was well pissed on Xmas day
(acting as Father Christmas) was due to his spending the night sleeping behind the bar, with the solvent fumes in the
air, whilst on
guard duty over the presents!
Complete with
a fully equipped (and clean!) kitchen, the clubhouse is the focus of the social
side of the club. Everything from an informal piss up to a formal VP lunch
and even the annual presentation
dinner/dance take place in the clubhouse. Much needed revenue is provided
by hiring out the clubhouse and the club's disco for weddings, birthday parties
and all sorts of events.
