Players' Profiles

While at primary school, (in New Zealand, up to 14 years old), he was already scoring tries, being consistantly the top points scorer in his year group, and was selected for the Ross Shield Representative Team (U14). During the same period he was involved in athletics and managed to win gold and silver medals in the New Zealand Colgate Games and the Waikato Championships, at under 14 in the 100 metres and the 4 x 100 metres relay .

From 1991 to 1994 Clint was student at the Dannevirke High School where his rugby education ran along with the academic. He continued to expand his rugby career with the Dannevirke Sports Club playing at under 19, under 21 and with the Premier team. During this time he played representative rugby for Hawkes Bay as a junior and at under 23, and, although not making the full Hawkes Bay side, he was a member of their National Provincial Comp. Development squad.

Clint came to England at the beginning of this season to play for Orrell, but had never been able to displace David Slemen from the fly half position and, although selected frequently to take the full back berth, the possibility of playing regularly at his favoured position of fly half for New Brighton appealed sufficiently for him to make the change. With the departure of Adam Butt back to Australia, the Blues were in urgent need for a replacement and the availability of a fly half with some pedigree was a chance not to be missed.

As with a great proportion of New Zealanders, Clint is a farmer back home and was managing a dairy farm prior to taking this opportunity for a break and to play rugby in England for a couple of seasons. We wish him every success, we hope he enjoys his time with the Blues and the experience of living in England will provide many happy memories.

By current standards Paul was arelative latecomer to the oval ball game, not having played until 20. Then, making up for lost time he played for a number of clubs in mid Wales among which were Llanagum and Haverford West. During this period in Mid Wales he was one of five players selected from his regiment to play against Pontypridd at Wrexham. His selection obviously unsettled Ponty and they retaliated by playing another ginger haired player, one Neil Jenkins, to even up the colour scheme! Following this Paul had a two year spell with Lydney, as he says "polishing up my technique".

When his Regiment was detailed to serve in Northern Ireland he played for several clubs in the 'All Ireland Qualifying League', Coleraine, Londonderry and notably Limavady when they won the League and reached the Final of the Northern Ireland Bass Cup competion.

Returning from his tour of duty in Northern Ireland, Paul was posted to the Army Youth Training Team at Wrexham and it was at this juncture he played a number of Games for Wrexham towards the end of the 1999 - 2000 season and represented North Wales in the Welsh Counties Cup Final.

During his time in the Army, Paul has represented the Northern Ireland Combined Services and was a member of the Royal Welch Fusiliers XV which won the Army Cup for the first time in the Regiments history in 1999 - 2000. He was also part of the squad which completed very successful tours of South Africa where they won four out of five matches, and the USA where they won three out of four.

Living now in Wrexham with his wife Joanne and 5 year old daughter Amy, they expect the arrival of their second child early in July 2001. That, as they say, is very good planning. There have been some nasty fines imposed for having important family events during the season! We wish them luck and hope that Paul will be with us for a long time to come.

Hamish's parents are both from Merseyside where his father had played for Southport and Ormskirk until his job took him to Grimsby where Hamish appeared on the scene in 1977. Another job move took the family to Portsmouth and Hamish started playing at Havant with the U8's through to the U10's. This was followed by a two year spell with Newbury U10's to U12's and then another move, to Nottingham where he and Tom Mapp became school mates. It was here that he joined Nottingham Moderns but, according to Tom, because he thought that they wern't very good, moved to Nottingham only to be battered (Tom's words) by them at their first encounter!

His representative rugby was played in the ensuing years appearing for Nottinghamshire U14 - U21s, Notts Lincs and Derby U14 - U21's and Midlands Colts. He also had a spell with Leicester Tigers Youth.

In 1996 he travelled, with Tom, to Australia where they played for Wollongong University and on return home, went to Birmingham University to follow his B.Sc. studies and to play for the University from 1996 - 99, though this was interrupted by a seroious knee injury which took two operations and almost a year to correct.

From 1997 - 2000 he played for Stourbridge and was top points scorer for the club in the 1999 - 2000 season. When asked what he felt were his most notable appearances had been, the man with the nerve came up with "........scoring all 6 points for Stourbridge when they won the first match against New Brighton". To say it is bad enough, but to do so in our clubhouse and with a smile on his face deserves a substantial fine at least ! (G. Jones and L. Connor take note.)

Ironically, his first 1st XV appearance, at Sandal, came as the result of an injury to Tom Mapp and since then Hamish has certainly earned his corn, especially against Walsall, when his defensive work did more to save the day than his last minute try which won the game for us.

As well as playing rugby Hamish is also a keen golfer and squash player and has an interest in most sporting activities. His two main ambitions which are, in life, to run his own sports based business, and in rugby, ".............to get out of this sodding division". Well we'll all drink to that Hamish and let's go a bit farther and make it this season. So long as it is getting out of it in the right direction then I am sure the team will all qualify for a few free beers

He moved on to the Macclesfield Senior side in 1987 and it was in this year that he won his first full County cap at the age of 20, and when he played for both the Cheshire Senior and U21 sides. This high spot was tempered somewhat by a "fortnight to forget" when, in the space of two weeks, both sides were beaten by Yorkshire by an aggregate of over 100 points.

In 1990 he moved on to Orrell were he stayed for four years playing for the 1st XV. It was during this period that Orrell had an excellent run in, what was then, the 'Pilkington' Cup, reaching the semi final round when they had the misfortune to meet Northampton. It was also with Orrell that he had the good fortune to represent his club in the Dubai Sevens, an experience which he considers on of the high spots of his career.

From Orrell, Iain moved to Winnington Park in 1994, where he captained the club and took the side to the fifth round of the Cup.

After his spell at Winnington Park he returned to his old club Macclesfield for a short period after which he spent one season with Northwich before coming to New Brighton at the start of this season.

Iain has played representative rugby pretty well throughout his career appearing for Cheshire Colts, North of England Colts, England Colts, Cheshire U21s, North of England U21s, and the Cheshire Senior side from 1987 to 2000. Out of all this his only regret is missing out on playing for the County at Twickenham.

He still lives in Macclesfield where he holds down a demanding position of Development Director with a building construction company.

His rugby career began at the ripe old age of six years when he became a member of the Mynydd Isa "Minis". A couple of years later his club merged with the Yr Wyddgrug Club, ('Mold' to you lot), and it was at this club that he experienced many hard fought battles against the new Brighton Minis ! The results of these contests haven't been mentioned atall so I suppose we can only assume that we won.

He remained with Mold until he was twenty when his work took him to Leeds, where he joined Headingly RFC. At Headingly he gained much valuable experience playing against most of the big English Clubs, Northampton, in particular, who were then captained by Wayne Shelford and were at the top of the First Division.

On returning to North Wales he played once more for Mold after a brief spell with Bangor. The spell at Bangor, however, turned out to be one he could well have done without having suffered a snapped cruciate ligament which somewhat curtailed his activities for a while.

He left Mold in 1998 to join Chester, where he played for for two seasons before coming to New Brighton. During this period he played representative rugby for North Wales several times and also made five appearances for Cheshire in the 1999 - 2000 season when Cheshire narrowly missed winning the championship for the second year running.

Married to Julie, who is a P.E. teacher at the John Summers High School in Deeside, they have 2 children, Aled 3 and Bethan 8 months. Steve claims he always intended to have a 'sevens' side but is rapidly coming to the conclusion that two is more than enough.

His first taste of rugby was at Dyffryn Conwy School in Nant Conwy, just a step down the valley from Llanwrst, where he played scrum half in the School 1st XV at U16 level and followed this up by playing in the Gwynedd side which won the Welsh District Cup at U15 level.

Following on from this, he studied agriculture at the Aberystwyth College and played for Aberystwyth Youth at centre. It was during this period that he was a Welsh Youth trialist and narrowly missed a Welsh Youth Cup Cup final appearance, when Aberystwyth Youth were beaten by Cardiff Youth in the dying minutes of the semi final. He did, however, play again in Gwynedd's Welsh District Cup winning side, this time at senior level.

Next stop was Llandovery where, during his two years at the club, he again played at centre and appeared against many of the major Welsh Clubs, Cardiff, Swansea and Neath to name but a few, playing in the Swalec Cup and it was during the Cardiff game that he gained a bit of glory by beating Wales and Lions centres Lee Davies and Mike Hall to score a try. An effort that resulted in him winning the 'Man of the Match' award for the game. It was round about this time that he also made an appearance for the 'Crawshay's' XV.

From Llandovery he then moved up to the Wrexham Norhtern Counties Club where he spent a year before arriving, this season, at New Brighton.

Since his arrival here, where he has been a regular at inside centre, he has given some solid performances, not least at Tynedale where he touched down for a very valuable try in a game when Tynedale suffered their first defeat in two seasons.

Married to Caryl, his ambitions now focus on raising a family of Welsh centres, preferably of the international variety, and continuing to maintain a good standard of play in his own game. He is also extremely interested in breeding a flock of genetically modified sheep, which will come down from the hill when he blows a whistle instead of having to chase them in his wellies - those Welshsheep are very suspicious of that sort of thing !

He commenced playing rugby at his local junior school in 1986, at the age of 7 and, at the end of year 4 he moved to a Marist college in Canberra, a school with a strong rugby tradititon which produced, among others, distinguished players such as Rob Egerton, Micheal O'Connor and Joe Roff.

Adam played there throughout his school career, from the U9 side to the 1st XV in 1996 when he joined the "Canberra Royals" where he played on the wing.

From the Royals he moved on to the "Kookaburras", another Canberra club, which incidently, produced Wallabies Joe Roff, Rod Kater and Jeremy Paul and which ultimately changed its name to "Canberra Vikings". He played Full back with this club at Colts level initially and subsequently at first and second team level in the New South Wales League.

During this period he was a member of the Australian Capital Territory (A.C.T.) Rugby Academy which acts in association with, and as the development squad for, the "Brumbies", the Canberra State Super 12 Club, playing in the U19 and U21 XVs until the year 2000.

(A "Brumby", incidently, is a highland wild horse and not, as you might suppose, an immigrant of Midlands origin.)

Rugby ambitions?. Well, in his own words, ".........'The Wallabies' is always a dream", but he seriously hopes to be playing in a Super 12 side within the next 5 years. In this respect we wish him well. Certainly in the few matches he has played in the New Brighton jersey he has impressed us very much with his commitment and skill. One little known fact which illustrates the former is what he refers to as his "stitch count", 298 being the latest tally, the best(?) of which was 48, needed as a result of a head injury received during a Marist College Match against the local Grammar School at the age of 14!

In the immediate future, however, he is hoping to do some coaching with local schools and in this respect, any assistance from those of the teaching profession in our midst would not go amiss.