Rugby League celebrates its one millionth participant
Anthony Collins from Huddersfield has become the one millionth person in this country to participate in a community Rugby League event delivered by a professional club.
Anthony is involved in the Huddersfield Giants Community Touch Rugby programme that takes place at The Zone each Wednesday from 7.00pm and will be presented with a special Giants shirt with 1,000,000 across the back on the Galpharm Stadium pitch at half time during Friday’s Engage Super League fixture against Wigan.
The one million figure is made up of individuals involved in actual Rugby League activity delivered by a professional club such as coaching, Touch Rugby sessions for all ages, festivals and holiday activities in school sand community clubs and does not include assemblies, classroom activities orstadium tours.
All clubs in the Super League and Championships, apart from French sides Catalan Dragons and Toulouse Olympique, contribute to the professional club community Key Performance Indicators which have been collected on a quarterly basis for six years.
The RFL’s Director of Participation and Strategic Partnerships David Gent said: “It’s fantastic that over one million participants across the country have been involved in community Rugby League events organised by professional clubs.
“Passing this one million milestone is testament to the excellent and high quality work which the development staff at all professional clubs do in the heart of their local communities.”
Huddersfield Giants‘ Key Performance Indicator submission for the period between December 1 2010 and February 28, 2011 took the total over the milestone of 1,000,000 participants, of which 55 percent are male and 45 per cent female.
The Giants total for this period was 2,740 taking the total figure to 1,001,456
Laura Hanson, Huddersfield Giants in the Community Manager said: “This figure is a fantastic achievement and one that all community development teams will be very proud of.
“At Huddersfield Giants in the Community we are excited to be a part of the fantastic Rugby League development work going on across the UK and we will be continuing to work hard to help achieve the next milestone.
“Anthony Collins is the official one millionth participant and has come from the very successful Touch Rugby initiative that Huddersfield Giants run at The Zone every Wednesday evening.
“The Touch Rugby programme on a Wednesday evening is one of many programmes that are developing in the Huddersfield area to engage more people into the sport of Rugby League at a variety of levels.”