Club doing all it can to engage with members
Parrott believes benefits of Maids' hard work will be visible in time
Maidenhead’s director of rugby Myke Parrott says the club is doing everything it can think of to stay engaged with its players and members and hopes in 12 months’ time everyone will see the benefits of those efforts during a really challenging time.
It’s been a difficult time for all community clubs but Maids approach has somewhat different to those who’ve simply shut down operations until a time when the competitive action returns.
These past few weeks have seen hundreds of members take part in virtual workouts on a Sunday morning while coaches and players remain actively involved through online coach education sessions, theory sessions, strength and conditioning challenges.
The club has also appointed a new director of women’s and girl’s rugby, with an announcement on that set to be made this week. The newly named Iron Maidens will take to the field later this year, while the club hopes to start u13s and u17s girls’ teams and is planning to hold taster sessions as soon as restrictions are eased.
Their hopes of getting back to competitive action early in the new year have been thwarted but there’s still plenty going on at the club.
“We do everything we can to stay positive,” he said.
“When we look back and reflect on the last nine months a lot of people will ask what the club was doing and how it
coped with what has happened. I don’t think there will be many who could say that we did nothing. All the way through this we’ve sought to do as much as we can for the players, members, kids and coaches.
“There have been coach education sessions via video link, we’ve been doing workouts for members on Sunday mornings. We’ve just done what we can to help people in the community to get through this and stay active.
“My personal concern is for
the children. Not just for my children, but for children all around the country. They’re missing education and all that social development. My two just want to see their friends and their gran and they can’t, and I’m really worried about the impact this is having on children.
“So, it was brilliant to see the children having some semblance of normality on a Sunday morning in the workouts. Seeing their mates, getting off the sofa and away from the X-Box or the TV. Having a little bit of a runaround and a laugh. It is just about keeping everyone engaged and together.”
The club may not have played a competitive match since March, but Parrott said they’d be ready and raring to go at all levels just as soon as they get the green light from Government.
“We’re doing a lot,” added Parrott. “I will soon be announcing a new director of women’s rugby, which is a brilliant appointment. I’m sworn to secrecy on that. We’ve also got a new team name for the women, the Iron Maidens. We’re moving forward with plans to reach out to local schools regarding the start of girls’ rugby teams at u13s and u17s age groups. We’ll be doing taster days for them as soon as we can.
“Mobbsy (head coach David Mobbs-Smith) has been doing some great coach education sessions for coaches right through our club. We’ve been doing theory sessions with our seniors, looking at attack and defence systems and there’s been the online Sunday morning workouts with the kids and everyone at the club.
“Our strength and conditioning coach has been running some programmes for the players.
“They’ve been getting two sessions per week and they have to go out and post their scores. We’re doing everything we can to keep as many people engaged as possible.”