01726 833014 www . galleon-inn . com | info @ galleon-inn . co . uk 12 Fore Street , Fowey , Cornwall PL23 1AQU
Lankelly-Fowey
Atmosphere
“ The club is absolutely buzzing at the moment . Mark Cook our Club Captain has recently led and finished a project of building two brand new changing rooms . We are all really excited about rolling out a few initiatives over the Summer to recruit more young players to bolster our Junior section .
Bruce McTavish our grounds man and Rob Bell our Secretary have been successful in getting funding from the RFU and Natwest for pitch and flood light improvements . To top off all the great things that are happening at the club at the moment we have just won the Cornwall 2 League title for the first time in nearly 30 years .”
This Season
“ This season has been fantastic with us cementing the League Title on 8th April . We still have a few outstanding cup and friendly fixtures but celebrations have definitely already started with the season drawing to an end .
The two main keys to success for me are 1 ) The right mixture of young , fit and hungry players forming the baulk of the team supported by a handful of old heads leading the squad . 2 ) The coaching team lead by Sion has been exemplary this year with meticulously planned sessions with a real focus on ball handling , communication and fitness . Sion has been supported by Matt Hodson who has bought a lot of strength and consistency to our lineout while a returning Harvey Jones mid-way through the season has had a real positive impact of the strength of our scrum .”
season . We have flood lights at the top side of the pitch and we ’ ve recently bought two mobile floodlights to enable us to train in the light in the winter months . We are currently creating a small training pitch which involved importing over 15000 tonnes of spoil and we hope to have this ground seeded and ready for use for the 17 / 18 season .”
Challenges / Ambitions
“ We ’ ve been blessed in the last two seasons but maintaining senior player numbers has always been an issue for the club . We also have a few gaps in the youth section where we don ’ t have teams for certain age groups which means there will not be any new young players naturally progressing to senior rugby for the next few years .
The same can be said for junior player numbers , it ’ s hard to keep junior players interested when we often have to cancel training sessions ; we only have the one pitch which is prone to water logging . Hopefully we can successfully complete the new training area this summer which will offer some robustness .
Firstly , our ambition is to increase junior numbers , we ’ ve seen how having a youth section has impacted on the senior squad . Personally for me though I believe if we can keep the same coaching staff and group of seniors players together for the next few seasons we can really push for promotion out of the Cornwall Leagues , something the club hasn ’ t ever been able to do in all of its history .”
Youth
“ Our youth section is relatively new and was only established around ten years ago but I firmly believe the club would not be in the position it is today without it . Nine or ten players who regularly start for the league winning 1st XV started out in our youth section . We have a few initiatives planned for the off season to try and boost youth numbers which include a leaflet drop to all of the primary and secondary schools within a catchment , entering a group of youngsters into the Annual Fowey Regatta Carnival to hand out recruitment posters and to hold a sports and recruitment day in conjunction with Fowey Regatta celebrations .”
Community
“ We are a community club with the vast majority of our members living within a two mile radius of the club . We openly encourage the wider community to make use of our facilities for whatever their needs , not for profit but just to try and establish the club house as a focal point for the town .”
Facilities
“ From what effectively was a tin shack in a sheep field on the side of a hill compared to the facilities we have now we have come an awful long way since the club was established back in 1968 . That being said , there is a real desire to keep improving our facilities year on year .
Our club house was built four years ago and the current changing rooms were only finished at the beginning of this
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01726 833014 www . galleon-inn . com | info @ galleon-inn . co . uk 12 Fore Street , Fowey , Cornwall PL23 1AQU
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