Last Friday evening (14th April) was very special for the Welsh Rugby Union Community Volunteers as they were honoured and applauded at the first ever COMMUNITY VOLUNTEER OF THE YEAR AWARDS. The event recognised Volunteers across the Community game and their achievements in the last twelve months and previous.
The event began with pitch side drinks at the Principality Stadium before moving to a special awards dinner in the President’s Suite with Scott Quinnell leading us through the night.
This was the first type of these awards for the Welsh Rugby Union Community Department and a perfect chance to recognise some of the unsung heroes from the community game.
It was a pleasure for South Wales Life to be invited to the ceremony and bring you a small flavour of what went on throughout the evening. Hopefully we’ve managed to get as many recipients into our film as possible. We particularly wanted you to meet 5 year old AVA MATHIESON who won the Young Volunteer of the Year Award, having raised a thousand pound for her brother’s rugby club tour.
You’ll also see DR DAVE PEMBERTON who collected the Special Recognition Award for saving the life of Steffan Howell.
Steffan suffered a cardiac arrest while playing for his local team Clwb Rygbi Cymru Caerdydd. He was dead for 17 minutes before Dave, the team physio stepped in to save his life.
Volunteering in rugby goes beyond the coaches and referees. There are opportunities for everyone to get involved in a range of activities and roles which are essential to the game.
Volunteers are trained and work together with the clubs to make them feel part of the environment and retain their valuable time and efforts.
We congratulate all recipients and nominees and indeed everyone who supports our rugby clubs and keeps Welsh Rugby well and truly rooted in our best traditions. For more information on volunteering go HERE.
