Andy Jackson, RFU Club Volunteer Recognition Award

Rob Hamnett,  Peter Smith, Arthur Ashcroft, Andy Jackson, Chris Askew, Rob Sparkes

We are very proud of all the many volunteers at Lymm RFC, who willingly give their time and expertise in the running of our great Club. It is a great testament to the culture and DNA of our amateur Club, developed and sustained for over 60 years, which generates so many helpers.

Each year the RFU requests nominations from clubs for their Honda sponsored Volunteer Recognition Programme. This year our Club management secretly nominated Andy Jackson, a member of our dedicated Grounds Maintenance team. Andy also travels home and away each week with the 1^st XV, setting up our match video camera and for home matches organises car parking and managing the scoreboard. He’s ever present at the Club throughout the week, available to help wherever he can.

We are pleased to announce that Andy was one of 12 club volunteers throughout England to receive the RFU award. Here Andy describes his experience, together with a link to photographs taken on the day.

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At the beginning of April I received an email out of the blue advising me that I had been selected to attend a “money can’t buy experience” at Twickenham Stadium on 4th May 2023.

My first thoughts were, “oh, scam email, better just delete it”.  However it did look very authentic and genuine and after a couple of checks, the background to what was a genuine invite came out.

 Unbeknown to myself, I had been nominated by the Club to the RFU, as part of their Honda Volunteer Recognition Programme. This I found rather humbling, and I must confess, totally unexpected as like all of the grounds team in equal measure, we do what we do at Lymm Rugby Club for the enjoyment and love of the game with the aim of providing the best surfaces and presentation of our grounds and pitches for all our members and visitors.

This unique experience was for just twelve grounds volunteers from across the country to enjoy a behind the scenes day at Twickenham Stadium to include: – a stadium tour, walk the pitch, personal talk and presentation from RFU Head Groundsman Jim Buttar and for a chance in a lifetime opportunity for any groundsman, the opportunity to actually mow the “Hallowed Turf” of Twickers.

The day was indeed special and ten dedicated grounds volunteers attended on the day representing their clubs from the north to the south of England from all playing levels.

The highlight, at least for myself was the opportunity to actually be allowed to mow the pristine Twickenham pitch as part of its preparation for a series of games being hosted on the coming weekend.

Andy mowing the Twickenham Pitch

A great privilege indeed and on reflection I would think that there have surely been more people allowed to play on the pitch over its lifetime than to actually have been allowed to mow it.

My thanks to our Club and to the RFU for the opportunity to attend this event and hopefully the following link to photos will give a flavour of the day.

Photos

Yours in Rugby

Andy Jackson