MARYPORT
MARYPORT
Maryport ARLFC is a club that has made plenty of progress in recent times and enjoyed a
campaign to remember last time around. Rugby Club Magazine caught up with Club Secretary
Paul Willaimson to find out more.
He told us, “My favourite memory has to be last season.
Anyone not familiar with Maryport will be unaware that
the town has four rugby clubs, Netherhall RFU, Glasson
Rangers, Ellenborough Rangers and of course Maryport.
That is a lot of teams coming out of a very small t own
(population 15,000), and there is always competition for
players.
Coach Gary Murdock has rebuilt the club from the bottom
up during his three season tenure, and gave the players
new found confidence in their own abilities. To say
success was a long time coming is an understatement
and it was a fantastic experience for everyone associated
with the club to finally win some major silverware after so
many barren years.
Maryport for many, many years were the poor relations
in the town and silverware was not easy to come by. Last
season saw the club enjoy its most successful season
ever, winning the E. Lamb Amateur Cup, the Cumberland
Cup, the BARLA Cumbria Cup and also finished runnersup in the BARLA Cumbria Men’s League play-off final.
The general mood at the club is very good. We have
suffered a set-back in our quest to win the CML title,
having lost a very close game to Walney by 2 points,
and unfortunately our coach has had to step down from
coaching due to starting a new job, but these things
happen, and we have dusted ourselves down and are
starting to move forward again.
Youth rugby is extremely important to the club, but like
other sports it is becoming increasingly difficult to keep
young players in the sport. Our current successful first
team have virtually all come through the youth ranks, but
it is worrying and doesn’t bode well for the future.
We are a community club and our ground is used for
many non-sporting events including festivals, carnivals
and other events. These are major fundraisers and help
to sustain the rugby side.
We already have some of the finest amateur facilities
in amateur rugby league, so we are delighted to have
secured some major funding to improve the pitch and
facilities further. Sport England have given the club a major
award, and we have also secured funding from Robin
Rigg and Wren funds to help the club’s green credentials.
We are also hopeful that a further Sport England award
from Inspired Facilities will be forthcoming shortly as well
in addition to funding already secured.
We have had a steady stream of players gaining junior
BARLA honours over the last 10 years, including Sam
Forrester and Scott Akehurst, who were both selected
to tour Jamaica this year with BARLA under 23’s. Sam
Forresters is a bit of a tour veteran now, having toured
South Africa, Jamaica and Australia in the last four
seasons. We have some really good young players at the
club, and are hopeful further players will be selected for
honours in the coming seasons.
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ISSUE 49