Matt Healey and the Your Herefordshire team interviewed Hereford Rugby Club chairman Ivan Powell earlier this week.
Ivan told us about his relationship with Spencer Goodall, who is the club president. The full interview can be found bottom of this article.
Hereford Rugby Club is located in a picturesque part of the city with the River Wye running alongside the club. From the windows of the newly refurbished clubhouse, is a fantastic view of Hereford Cathedral as well as the main pitch where games are mainly played on a Saturday, with the odd midweek game.
In February 2020, Hereford was hit by record flooding, which saw the River Wye reach 6.1 metres at the Old Bridge, which was almost half a metre higher than previous records. This left many riverside clubs, such as Hereford Rugby Club, completely devastated by flooding.
This resulted in significant damage to club facilities, but this gave the clubs volunteers the passion and drive to recover and make the club an even better place going forward. The clubs facilities are now better than ever, with many off field events taking place, as well as the usual rugby.
Hereford Rugby club comprises of 2 senior teams. The 1st team playing in the Regional Midlands West League with the 2nd team play in the counties 3 Midlands West (South) table leagues. A colts team assembled with under 17 and 18s. The Colts play on Sunday afternoons, with the majority of first and second team players being ex colts players.
This shows the pathway at the club, with one of the largest junior sections in the Midlands with 350 players aged between 7-16 years old. A rich part of the club’s history was on February 11th 1989 when they faced Bath Rugby in the Pilkington cup fourth round, following a victory in the previous round against Tynedale where 1,500 watched at Wyeside.
Hereford also took 1,500 supporters down to Bath. One Bath supporter said that ‘Hereford certainly made a fight out of it’ despite loosing 48-0 to their higher-graded opponents. Close to the hearts of those involved at Hereford Rugby club are charities such as St Michael’s Hospice and more recently the Motor Neurone Disease Foundation https://www.mndassociation.org
The club have had a couple of former players suffer with the disease which has led to those associated with the club wanting to raise awareness of the condition.
Motor neurone disease is a rare condition affecting the brain and nerves. It eventually leads to death, but some people live with it for many years.
Symptoms of motor neurone disease include muscle weakness, twitches, slurred speech and difficulty swallowing. The symptoms get worse over time.
Treatment for motor neurone disease aims to ease the symptoms as much as possible. Treatments include physiotherapy, speech therapy and medicines. Motor neurone disease happens when cells in the brain and nerves, called motor neurones, gradually stop working. It’s not known why this happens.
