Saturday July 14th - Barnes Fair

Come and join in the fun at Barnes Fair 2012  -  Saturday July 14th 2012

Barnes RFC have a great pitch opposite St Osmunds so come and play our rugby game and win up £50 vouchers to spend in the Rugby Store at Twickenham

Director of Rugby Brett Taylor plans for the 2012/13 season

Well this season is now over but the good news is I am already busy planning for next season in National 3 when we will be aiming to bounce back with a vengeance and we will be gunning for promotion immediately.

England Legends Peter Winterbottom and Huw Davies hand out medals at Barnes minis festival April 2012

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The 2011/12 Season is now over....

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There are no more games this season however but on behalf of all of the players we want to say a massive thank you to our stalwart fixture secretary Jane Graham (long suffering wife of Gus!) for all her hard work to get us through every week of this season, It is a thankless task of juggling match officials, pitches, our captains, Wandsworth Council and of course our opposition and without her we would have no rugby to play!

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Results for 28th and 21st April 2012

In our last game in National 2 (for the time being!) the 1st XV were the only team to play on 28th and had to travel all the way to Lydney for their troubles. In a tight game our boys went down fighting and lost in the end 17-8. The 2’s were due to play Tonbridge Juddanians but they conceded and we had a walkover.

On 28th April The 1st XV played their hearts out at Barn Elms against Henley Hawks and but for a tough 20 minutes in the 2nd half the score would have been much closer than the 41-11 final scoreline suggests. for much of the first half the score was 5-5 but a try near half time gave the Hawks a 15-8 lead at the break. Barnes came under attack early in the 2nd half and conceded several tries under a physically larger team who battered us into submission, However, in true Barnes style we came back into it in the last 10 minutes and should be proud of our perfromance which unfortunatley confines us to National 3 next year.

The mighty 2's roar on however and crushed Readingensians 48-12. There is a real momentum and a feeling of success in this squad ably lead by Paul Spencer and sidekick Julius T'oo.

There were no other games this weekend other than the legends game which saw the Neil Murphy legends run out winners 6 tries to 1

Players Awards Supper - Saturday 28th April 2012

Fancy buying a Legends shirt signed by England Super Heros Peter Winterbottom and Jason Leonard?

Former London Irish and Surrey player Neil Murphy who ended his career as a player/coach at Barnes RFC suffered a brain haemorrhage in 2007 and was in a coma for three months. Miraculously he survived, but was left severely incapacitated and unable to walk unaided. Neil Murphy “Legends”, a team comprising various 50 year old plus ex-internationals plays against London Irish vets once a year to raise money for Neil. Many of you will remember the inaugural event in 2009. This year’s event LAST Saturday was a more modest affair  but we are still hoping to raise some more funds by auctioning 2 shirts signed by Peter Winterbottom (British Lions and England) and Jason Leonard (the most capped England player of all time with 114 appearances!).  

Please email bids to Simon Cooke scooke@cookeandpowell.com by 6pm on Friday 18th May . Simon will announce winners and delivery of shirts!

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A great day for Barnes RFC on 21st April 2012

100’s of people pitched up on Saturday for the minis festival, the Legends game and the 1st XV against Henley and the weather held off so everyone could enjoy this rugby extravaganza, relaxed and dry!

A massive thank you for Angus and Jane Graham and Simon Cooke for organising the Legends game and to Greg Watson and Owen Hughes and the family Ferridge Hugh, Tracey and Lauren for making the Minis festival purr like a Rolls Royce.

The Minis Festival......

Despite eight months of intensive preparation, the Minis were distinctly edgy about the prospects for our first-ever festival. What if no one turned up? Before the Easter break the concern was the ground would be too hard. After Easter we were worried it would be too wet and cold! And what if we'd overlooked one critical detail that would scupper the entire event?

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE FULL REPORT AND SOME PHOTOS

A host of talented Legends from Barnes, Neil Murphy Legends and London Irish at Barn Elms  - 21st April

The Legends Game...

Saturday 21st April saw the coming together of a Neil Murphy Legends and Barnes Vets team to take on the might of London Irish legends. In a week where the weather had threatened to put a spanner in the works, and reduce the number of spectators who could attend, the righteous won the day and the sun came out for the majority of it.

The combined team of Barnes and The Legends were too strong from London Irish, this was helped by the fact we had 39 players to their 24 and were able to give the elder players more rest time in-between exerting themselves on the pitch.

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE FULL REPORT AND SOME PHOTOS

Final Nat League 2 Results and Table April 28th 2012

Chris "Dunners" Dunlop in full flight!

Photo Courtesy of Ben Gilby

Barnes RFC - 100 Years Old (at least!)

Help us celebrate 100 years of Barnes rugby in 2013...

It is official  - 2012 is the centenary of Barnes RFC’s first registration with the Rugby Football Union (RFU)

Peter Boyd, our club scribe, has been beavering away and as a result of his research efforts, the RFU has now confirmed that the first registration of the Harrodian Rugby Club with them was in September 1912 (start of 1912/3 season) with the Club Secretary being Mr F. G. Kerswell

for the rest of this story click here...

Barnes 1st XV from 2010/2011 season  - Barnes celebrate victory in the last game of the season to win National League 3 South outright!

The Two Marty's have been picked to star in the remake of Twins with Matin Conway taking the De Vito role and Martin Bayfield the Schwarzenegger role  - the two bosom buddies are pitcured here at the highly successful Barnes RFC City Lunch at the RAC CLub

Thank You Gary Holmes! 

Si "Gibbo" Givens storms to the line for one of his two tries in Barnes' impressive 75-3 thumping over Diss in 2010/11 season

Photo courtesy of Ben Gilby

The Chairman speaks!

Michael "Rhino" Whitfield, Barnes RFC's Chairman

As I cry into my 11th pint of Guinness at being relegated from National League 2, I know I need to man up and thank a huge amount of people for this season that has just passed.

Our minis section has gorwn to over 200 players and this is a tribute to the 30 parent coaches, well led by Hugh Ferridge and a whole host of supporting stars.

I wlud like to thank all of our supporters, sponsors, players and minis parents I want to say thank you so much for your continued, and incredibly generous, financial support. Running a rugby club is bit like being a Eurozone finance minister and without you the club has no chance of operating as we do.

Secondly I want to thank our Captains and Coaches, led by Brett Taylor and Jamie Turner, for their deication to the cause of Barnes RFC. Our wonderful outgoing 1st XV Captain,Gary Holmes will be sorely missed as will the retiring 2nd XV Captain Chris Brown, ably support by Coach Paul Spencer and Julius T'oo. Courtney Magg-Jones has relentlessly juggled over 80 players in the Development XV in a challenging first season whilst the Occies, ably led by Alex Riggs and Tom Sunderland, ploughed serenely on playing quality rugby whenver they wanted to. Nick Bradley, with his own unique style of motivation, signed off his second season in charge of the Vets with frustratingly few fixtures as many of our oppostion either decided not to play us or just could not get a team out.

The Ladies had a better season this year led by Terri-Ann Kelly and new coach Nathan Kelly.

Off the field I also want to thank the unsung heroes that keep the club going, our Club President  - Monique Bruce Copp, Dave Doonan, (Hon Sec), Robbie Orr (Sponsorship Guru) Andy Pickering (Playing Director), Ken Macrae (1st XV Manager) Zoe Rand and extended family (Clubhouse Manager and Zoe's little helpers) Jane Graham (Fixtures) Camilla Campbell Stanay (Social Sec) a whole host of physios lead by Beck Grant and, last, and certainy not least - Martin Conway, Clubman of the Year, club comedian and generally always present -  he maybe short of stature but he is long on love for Barnes RFC!

Enjoy the Summer and see you in August for the new season when we wil come back raring to do it all again next season! Make no mistake, we will be planning furiously over the summer to make a sustained assualt on National 3 with a view of getting back up to National 2 as soon as we can

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Fund Raising Update!

We are now planning to put up the fist part of our wall in the club house and we will have a celebration for all of those who have donated at the start of the 2012/12 season.

Please don't stop giving, we are half way there and we still need to finish the outside, paint and guttering and new signage in order to complete Phase 2.

To remind you, in Phase1 we have repaired the roof, rewired the whole building, put in new lighting and replaced the swags on roof with a new carpet to boot. We also now have hand driers in the loos.

This little lot used up most of what we have raised so far so we now need to crack on to the finish line and reach our £30,000 target.

If you would like to donate now please go here now and get donating right now:

http://www.justgiving.com/Michael-Whitfield

picture courtesy of Hakan Yazici, Deadlinepix

Barnes have only indoor rugby pitch in the country

In an moment of inspiration we called on Barnes old players Bryn Lee and Jonathan Gallagher from Easigrass to replace our old carpet in the clubhouse with an artificial rugby pitch. This has gone down a storm and we even have a half way line by bar to eoncourage late night scrummaging!

Plans are afoot to add two 22 meter lines and posts and protectors... watch this space but in the interim come nad check it out!

A massive thanks to Bryn and Jonathan for doing this for us at no cost!

Briitish Lions, England and Quins legend Peter Winterbottom passes to Nick Bellis in the Barnes Vets vs Teddington game

(picture courtesy of Jerry Halse)

Old Vets Captains Bryn Lee and  Steve Trew admire Pete Tyler's new found telephony skills whilst Ashley Nicholson makes love to the camera at the 2010 Vets Reunion Lunch where 150 of you turned up on a freezing day in January  (picture courtesy of Jeffy Halse)

Barnes compete in the line out against Rosslyn Park

Jason Leonard looking suitably nervous about scrumaging against Rhino before the start of the Barnes Vets vs Legends XV for the Neil Murphy Benefit fund - the legends won 22- 17