We will have two outside bars, two BBQ’s and inside the clubhouse the bar will be open and the kitchen will be serving hot drinks, hot soup, pies and pasties. There will be sweets trolley and special fireworks gifts like glow sticks for sale and a big raffle.

Sorry. NO SPARKLERS PLEASE.

Entrance is via the side gate where you will be asked to drop off your firework. Car parking will be in the lane with cars parking by the pitch side of the lane parking with their headlights FACING the pitch only. Once full it will be in the mini car park and then around the mini pitches, NOT on them.

Then on Saturday 5 November we host Bury St Edmunds and this pre match lunch will be Mike Drinkwater’s final Presidents Lunch as he steps down at the end of season AGM after what will be 27 years as President of our great club.

Mike joined the club in the summer of 1962, in the season after its formation, playing at centre for all the senior sides until he was 30, and then, seeing the light, reverting to prop for over 10 years until he hung up his boots. Mike served in various positions within the club, most notably Chairman from 1983 until 1996 and now as President.

Mike is also an Honorary Life Member of Essex County RFU having served as the Essex County RFU Rep on the Eastern Counties Management Committee from 1990 and the Essex and Eastern Counties RFU Council Representative from 1995 until 2006. He was also Essex County RFU Honorary Secretary from 1986 until 2004, and Essex County RFU President from 2006 until 2008.

One of the highlights of his career was his role as RFU Council member, a volunteer job he loved doing. During this time he successfully proposed the separation of Essex County RFU from Eastern Counties RFU at the RFU AGM on the 3rd July 2003.
To commemorate Mike’s service to the RFU he was made a Distinguished Member of RFU in 2006.

We thank Mike for all his hard work and dedication to Rochford Hundred RFC, and I know he will continue to support the club in any way he can.

At the Special General Meeting in September the meeting agreed to increase monthly subscriptions by £10 per calendar month. In addition, I mentioned that we would like to fit solar panels to the roof. I have submitted a bid for some grant aid if we get the grant it will cover up to 40% of the cost. The total costs is till C£20,000. We have had £2000 donated so far from members with another £5000 pledged. That leaves us still to find around an additional £5000 for the project to go ahead. If you would like to make a donation, no matter how much, towards this cost please contact me, CHAIRMAN@ROCHFORDRUGBY.COM. A special thanks to those who have already donated, you know who are.

The reason for the Special General Meeting was because money is tight so we need all the income we can get. We hope to get as many outside private bookings as we can get, as we can make good money from non-club members. We try to avoid clashes as best we can, but when we get enquiries a year ahead, we tend to take them as we can’t predict what fixtures etc we might have on some dates.

Once clash has arisen on the day England play the All Blacks and on this day the Clubhouse will be closed for this private function. That is Saturday November 15. However, we will be showing all the other England games. We now have 4-pint pitchers available, so instead of having to go to the bar, why not get a 4 pinter before the game starts and just sit down and watch?

Christmas is not that far away and some of you lucky people will be given a Christmas Hamper or two. We have some members who for whom Christmas is very tough and we want to help them as much as we can. Jayn Warner, our Safeguarding Officer, also works with a group called Family Solutions. They are collecting Christmas Hampers or other donations which will be split up and delivered to families just before Christmas, including members of our club. Lets see if we can help bring a little bit of joy to these families at this special time of the year. You cant Jayn on 07903 024714 or jayn.warner@essex.gov.uk.

A topic at the forefront of a lot of conversations in Rugby at the moment is head injuries and concussions. This issue is affecting the game at all levels, and as a Club, we have been looking into how we can protect and assist all of our players.

We are currently working with a company called Return2Play (R2P). They are the UK’s leading sports medicine provider for schools and clubs. Providing gold standard care for Head Injury & Concussion Care to over 100,000 people at over 80 schools and clubs, both elite and grassroots, including Gloucester, London Irish and Ealing.

They have a team of the UK’s leading concussion experts, who have managed over 5000 youth concussions to date, that we would have unlimited access to, with appointments available 7 days a week, 360 days a year.

Should a Player get injured, our Team Managers records the injury on the R2P System and automated notifications are sent to all stakeholders (Player, Physio, Manager, Parent etc). The Parent or Player books and has an appointment with a Return2Play Doctor and automated recovery updates are sent to all stakeholders and repeated until the Player is fit to ‘Return2Play’.

As a club we are talking to Return2Play about a club wide discount for all players to be able to enrol, and our recommendation will be that all players take up this offer.

We will send out a message via team managers as soon as we have finalised this.

Lastly for this month, we have booked Chris Robshaw as the after-dinner speaker for our Annual End of Season Awards Dinner to be held on Friday 5 May 2023. Make a note in your diaries.