Leinster Rugby v Dragons

Blackrock
College RFC
Blackrock College is thinking longterm
when it comes to putting
in place a programme to lift the
participation of women at their
club.
Whereas many clubs are looking
at building from the top down, the
volunteers out in Stradbrook are most
interested in opening their arms to the
younger girls in the community.
The long-term process grew out of one of
the Irish Rugby Football Union’s initiatives
to attract more girls to play the sport.
“This was all triggered by the Give It A
Try (GIAT) Programme,” says Blackrock
College Youths Co-ordinator Killian
O’Sullivan.
“We were encouraged to submit
an application and members of the
Blackrock senior squad got involved with
the view of hosting the programme last
summer.
“When we received the go-ahead, it was
mostly run by the senior squad and it
became a roaring success.
“When the programme ended, the squad
wanted to continue the good work by
holding sessions on a Sunday morning
for the young girls who wanted to keep
playing rugby.
“That is where it all started from,” he
adds.
“As the weeks went on, of course
allowing for the pandemic and all the
stoppages, the number of girls steadily
grew as they went back to school to tell
their friends.”
In the meantime, the Leinster Rugby
Women’s Development Officer Emily
McKeown was going into nearby schools
and hosting fun, non-contact sessions.
This provided a double-whammy effect
of Leinster promoting the game within the
schools allied to those who made their
way to Blackrock through GIAT and,
subsequently, word-of-mouth.
Before long, there was a considerable
cohort of players returning to the club
week-on-week. It didn’t go unnoticed.
O’Sullivan and committed members
Gavin Hegarty and Mike Conn, as well
as Transition Year student Caoimhe
McWilliams, turned serious thought into a
practical proposal to seize the moment.
“The club threw its weight behind
supporting the girls in the form of
providing equipment and a nice slot
on the new all-weather pitch,” shares
O’Sullivan.
“It gathered momentum from there as
parents showed the same enthusiasm as
the girls. It was perfect as we had been
trying to get a girls section going at the
club for a long time.
“We have a very successful senior team.
But, we don’t have a youths team and we
didn’t have a minis section, specifically
for girls.”
For years, there had been no joinedup
thinking around how to make it
worthwhile to build the ladies section
top-to-bottom.
“We struggled to envision how we could
form a youths team from nothing because
girls had made their sporting decisions
long before they reach 18.”
The GIAT opened their eyes to doing
it another way, targeting the six to 12
age groups, building from the groundup,
rather than the top down, as part of
a longer-term commitment to making it
sustainable.
In time, this can lead to a flow of players
from minis into youths teams with the
ultimate goal of filling up a feeder system
into the Blackrock College senior squad,
making a clear pathway from minis to
adult rugby.
“The club has been trying to reach
out to the community for quite some
time. Getting the girls in is such a good
opportunity because the parents bring
their daughters down and there is no
shortage of volunteers to help out in any
capacity,” says O’Sullivan.
“Also, we have a large boys section,
numbering into the 100s, and a lot of
them have sisters.
From The Ground Up | 80 | www.leinsterrugby.ie