Category Archives: Ebbw Vale Rugby

Ebbw Vale RFC Squad 2019 / 20

With the last few years being extremely tough financially it has become necessary for the club to bow to financial pressures whilst considering the squad for the coming season.

The officials of the club would encourage all supporters of the club to assist in maintaining a strong club by getting involved in initiatives such as Friends of EbbwVale RFC, supporting the club lottery, assisting in raising sponsorship and volunteering to assist in anyway they can

Squad News

Departures

Club Captain Ronny Kynes after 8 seasons, 201 games and 97 tries will be departing to add his considerable experience and driving of the bus to Bargoed’s attempt to bounce back up to the Premiership at their first attempt. This was an incredibly hard decision for Ronny as he has lived red, green and white during his time at the club. His dedication to the cause has seen him play the last part of our Premiership Championship winning season with a broken jaw, this just being one example of how he has gone above and beyond the call of duty for the club. Ronny will be long remembered for his whole-hearted commitment, skill and the famous Catch n Kynes that has become so well known in Welsh rugby. 33 year old Ronny, has been Welsh Rugby Writers’ Player of the Year, Premiership top try scorer and won numerous club awards and will be greatly missed off the pitch where he has driven high standards and kept spirits high as well as on the pitch.  I’m sure all will agree that Ronny will always have a place in the hearts of Ebbw Vale supporters and a warm welcome at the club

It has already been published that Rhys Jones, the top points scorer in the Principality Premiership in 2018/19 will be leaving to join league champions Merthyr RFC. This was purely a financial decision by the club and Rhys has displayed great integrity in this situation that has been difficult for both parties. All at the club wish Rhys a successful season at the Wern and he can be assured of a warm welcome at ECP.

Utility forward Rhys Clark is another who will be departing after 8 years with the club. A hugely talented forward who was equally adept in the second or back row and despite some bad luck with injuries has amassed close on 150 games for the Steelmen. Rhys joined from Penallta and had to display patience in his first 2 seasons at the club, but worked hard to force his way into the starting team where he rarely has had a bad game, Rhys is likely to join Pontypool.

Lloyd Evans will also be leaving the club to join Aberavon to cut down on the amount of travelling from his home in the Bridgend area. Lloyd brought some real excitement and skills to the back row as befits a Welsh 7’s international and will leave with fond memories of the club.

AND NOW THE GOOD NEWS

The club is delighted that the following players have committed to the club

Props

Ross Jones and Rob Severnoaks will enter their tenth season as Steelmen, and will be joined by Joel Harries, Morgan Davies and Luke Garrett

Hooker

Joe Franchi, Rhys Francis

Second Row

Lance Randall, Kristian Parker and Ashley Sweet

Back Row

Owen Young, Dawid Rubasniak, Lewis Young, Cameron Reagan

Half Backs

Dai Jones, Sam Ireland, Matthew Flanagan, Dai Langdon

Centres

Dom Franchi, Paul King

Back 3

Luke Shore, Steff Thomas, Dan Haymond

Supporters can be assured that Greg Woods and his staff are working hard to bring in new talent to the club to strengthen what is already a strong core group and that we are confident that we have the right group of players and coaching staff to keep Premiership Rugby in North Gwent

Everyone at the club was saddened to receive the following news from former player Hayden Jefferies, regarding his father, Sid.

“My father Sid Jeffreys coached Ebbw Vale for one or two seasons after Phil Gardiner was coach, which I think was 1988 – 89. He had especially fond memories of the team and supporters from his time as coach and then later on when I played for both the youth team and second team and we were both  always made to feel welcome. On May 2^nd Sid passed away peacefully at The Royal Gwent Hospital, surrounded by his loving family. The funeral is being held on 24^th May 2019 at St Cadoc’s Church followed by a service at Gwent Crematorium at 1:30 pm. Family flowers only, donations in lieu to St Woolos Chest Clinic’s Pulmonary Fibrosis Charity c/o Tovey Bros, 9-11 Cardiff Road, Newport, NP20 2EH (01633-266848).”

Our deepest sympathies go out to Sid’s family at this sad time.

The weekly lottery draws run by the club and the WRU have been suspended until further notice. We’ll let you know when they return.

Fancy the chance of winning some cash while also giving financial help to the club we love?If so, here’s how to take part in the new club lottery:

1 Download the Digi4 app from apple store (free of charge).
2 When it is downloaded there will be a number of teams. Select EVRFC.
3 The front page shows previous draw results and date of next draw.
4 Choose bottom of the page icon to ‘purchase tickets’.
5 Select 4 numbers from 1 to 24.
6 The amount due goes to your basket.
7 Complete transaction (money transferred automatically).

The draw will take place every Thursday at around 7.30pm and the results will be published immediately.

After seeing him impressing with the Welsh Academicals, we signed Toby Fricker for the 2017/18 season and, from the start of that campaign, it was clearly evident that we had signed a player that would be the “talk of the town”. Toby has been ever present in the Ebbw side since joining us and this season he has played every minute of every game. His sheer aggression and passion has not only been influential but infectious in everything good about Ebbw this year. It is with great pride and pleasure that we announce that Toby has signed a two and a half year contract for English Premiership side Bristol Bears from today.

Toby said, “My time at Ebbw has been brilliant and I have enjoyed every second of it. The players, staff, coaches, officers and fans have been unbelievable over the past two seasons and it will be sad to say goodbye, but I am excited and grateful for this opportunity and cannot wait to get stuck in. I will look forward to coming to support Ebbw in the future! Thanks again to the boys, staff, coaches, officers and fans.”

We would like to thank Toby for his commitment and effort over the past two seasons and would like to wish him all the luck and success in this exciting new venture.

Ebbw won a tense St David’s Day thriller at ECP, beating Pontypridd 17-16.

The match report will appear here.

It was with great sadness that we learned, from his son Kim, that Jack Lawrence, our scrum-half of the early 50s, has died aged 92.  Club scribe and historian, the inimitable Roy ‘Rel’ Lewis, remembers him well, and said, “Jack Lawrence was one of our greatest scrum-halves and an important member of the Ebbw Vale side that won Welsh Championships in the 1950s.  He also played in the Ebbw Vale-Newbridge team that beat the South African Universities (The Sables) before a packed ground at Ebbw Vale in 1957.”

Jack’s former team-mate Francis Matthews was saddened when told the news and commented, “I was privileged to have played for Ebbw Vale in a period when we were such a good side and as a backrow forward benefited from such an exciting player as Jack who would break away at great speed with me in support. Someone once said before a game, ‘How many tries is Jack going to make for you today?’”

In 1960 a Past v Present game was arranged and Jackie Lawrence once again stood out. A real Ebbw Vale clubman and an outstanding scrum-half.

Our thoughts are with his family.

Please note the following fixture changes:

Ebbw Vale v Llandovery Thursday 14/03/19 ko 7:15pm (moved from 23/03/19)

Ebbw Vale v Neath Saturday 27/04/19 ko 2:30pm (rearranged postponed game).

There have been some changes in responsibilities for officers in the club. A new role has been created to deal with liaison between the mini and junior section and the senior team and management. Ian James has agreed to take on this role and as a result Karl Offers has taken over as club secretary.
Ian has been club secretary for 8 years starting at the time of the formation of Steelmen Rugby Limited and his efforts on behalf of the club since that time are much appreciated.
Karl, already known for his role as match day announcer, has been instrumental in creating Friends of Ebbw Vale.

A last play penalty try deep in injury time ended Ebbw’s cup campaign at a wet and windy Wern.

More here.

The club are able to confirm that back 5 forward Jonathan Davies has completed his transfer to Bedwas RFC as he looks to gain more game time. Jon, having initially impressed in the Fosters Cup on permit from Ynysddu, joined the club and impressed to the degree that he was voted Most Promising Player by the supporters that season. Since then he has suffered with injuries, and a recent change of job has limited his training time with the squad. Having recovered from several niggling injuries Jon has decided that, at 26 years old, he wanted to play every week. We would like to take the opportunity to thank Jon for his efforts in the Red, Green and White and wish him every success at Bedwas.

Two of the long term injured returned to the field in Friday night’s epic encounter with RGC and all at the club were delighted to see Dom Franchi and Dai Langdon fully recovered from their respective injuries. Their return was timely with wing / centre Paul King ruled out with a concussion that was sustained in the final minute at Aberavon just prior to Christmas,and with Carl Mayer returning to South Africa this week. It is hoped that Carl will return to the club in a short period.

The remaining long term absentees, prop Joel Harries and second row Lance Randall are working diligently with the medical team to meet February returns to action.

Ebbw Vale will play Merthyr at the Wern in round 2 of the National Cup. This is a repeat of last season’s semi final, a close game won by Merthyr who went on to win the Cup.

The match is currently scheduled for 2:30 on January 26th.

The draw in full is as follows:

Ebbw Vale travel to Carmarthen on Saturday for the 1st round of the National Cup.

The squad can be seen here.

Following Saturday’s 14-all draw at Aberavon, Ebbw won 37-18 with a bonus point at Bedwas on Boxing Day.

More information can be found  here.

The club shop will be open on Thursday evening, December 20th, between 6 and 8 pm, so you can buy those last minute bits of Ebbw regalia, without which, Christmas simply won’t be Christmas.

Update: here are details of Colin’s funeral.
Wednesday, December 19th, 1:45pm at St Paul’s Church, Cwm, followed by cremation at Llwydcoed, Aberdare at 3pm.
This will be followed by return to Ebbw Vale Rugby Club.

From Chairman Jon Jones
It is with great sadness that in the last 24 hours we have learned of the sudden and unexpected death of current committee man Colin Brennan.

Colin had a long association with the Steelmen, firstly as a supporter and in numerous roles within the club that included spells as Fixture Secretary, Team Manager, Director and he was also a driving force in establishing a Youth and then U21 team that saw him bring many players to the club who went on to perform with great distinction, among them Mathew “Chunky” Williams, Jason Strange and Andrew Bevan. Over the last few seasons Colin has been a great support to the officials at the club, willing to help out at all times and sharing his rugby experience for the better of the Steelmen. One of the last major tasks that Colin took on was the funding, sourcing and fitting of our new scoreboard and this he did as always with professionalism and without any fuss.

Colin also took on roles at Pontypool, Caerphilly and Rhiwbina RFC in partnership with coach and close friend Gareth Lintern as well as serving as a Team Manager within the Dragons Age Group system.

He will be greatly missed by all at Ebbw Vale RFC and at those other clubs he served with distinction.

Our sincere condolences go out to Colin’s family at this extremely sad time.

There will be a minute’s silence in Colins’s memory at our home fixture this Saturday when we play Cardiff RFC.

Details of the funeral arrangements will be published in due course.

Those supporters who are followers of social media will have seen that, as well as being first to the breakdown, our captain Ronny Kynes is equally sharp with news on Twitter! The medical team has confirmed the seriousness of Ronny’s foot injury, sustained in the latter part of Friday’s victory, with broken bones and ligament damage requiring an operation that ends Ronny’s on field contribution for 2018/19. He will undergo an operation on Wednesday 28th with our club Doctor, Rhys Thomas, and we as a club are grateful to Dr Rhys for the swiftness of the operation and the use of his undoubted sports injury surgical skills. Ronny will continue to play an active part off the field in driving the spirit and ethos of the club.

Head Coach Greg Woods has moved just as sharply to plug the back row gap in the squad and has signed open side Lloyd Evans a product of the Ospreys Academy who has extensive Premiership experiences with the clubs in that region. Observant supporters will have noted his excellent performance for Neath in the fixture earlier this season. He has also gained a wealth of experience with the Welsh 7’s squad, taking part in a significant number of the World Series 7’s tournaments. Lloyd will be with the Steelmen until the end of the season and will add to an extremely competitive and high quality back row roster.

On the prop front, the club can also confirm the completion of the transfer of former Dragons academy and Tredegar born loose head Luke Garrett to the club from Neath. Luke made his debut for the Steelmen as a 17 year old in a league fixture at Beddau and is well known by Head Coach Greg Woods due to his many games for Cross Keys whilst in the Academy and a squad member at the Dragons.

Young prop Jordan Rogers, who can play both sides of the scrum, has decided to make his dual registration with Risca a full time switch as he looks to maximise his training and game time at a lower level to develop his game. We thank him for his loyalty as a squad member and wish him success at Risca where his progress will continue to be monitored.

Centre Dom Franchi is still 2 to 3 weeks away from a return with the ankle injury sustained at the end of the Pontypridd game taking longer than expected to heal. Dom continues to work hard under the supervision of the medical team to ensure a timely and successful return to the field.

There will be some alterations to Ebbw’s matches around Christmas and into the new year.

We travel to Aberavon on Saturday, 22nd for a 2:30 kick off and then play ar Bedwas on Boxing Day, Wednesday 26th. This will be televised but we don’t yet have a confirmed kick off time.

Keep an eye out for travel arrangements on the Ebbw Addicts page and twitter feed.

The home game with RGC, originally set for January 12th, will now kick off at 7:10pm on Friday, January 11th and be shown live on BBC2 Wales.

The attritional nature of the Premiership is now beginning to affect the Ebbw Vale squad and all Ebbw supporters should bear this in mind when looking at chosen squads.

First the good news…
Carl Meyer has recovered from the hamstring strain and will be fit for selection this Friday.
Jonathan Davies has recovered from the shoulder injury sustained at the end of last season and, following a few comeback games with Ynsddu, is now available for selection.
Toby Fricker has recovered from the strains and knocks following the Merthyr game and will be available for selection this Friday; he has, however, requested that he doesn’t have to play in the back row!
James Lewis is also available for selection following recovery from a virus.

The less than good news…
Dom Franchi after sustaining an ankle injury in the final minutes of the Pontypridd game is 1/2 weeks away from being available for selection.
Joel Harries who sustained an ankle injury in the warm up for the Merthyr game has had an operation under the capable scalpel of Dr Rhys Thomas  this week and his expected return is 12 weeks. This is particularly disappointing for young Joel who has performed extremely strongly in the first 8 games of the season.
Cameron Reagan sustained a head injury just prior to half time in the attritional Merthyr game and will be available for selection after this week.
Lance Randall suffered a bicep injury in the Merthyr game. Lance is awaiting a medical review which will be completed this week and is facing a 12 to 20 week lay off depending on medical opinion of the correct course of action for the injury sustained.
Ashley Sweet is still 1/2 weeks away from being fit for selection following the rib injury sustained in the Cross Keys game.
Rhys Clarke having suffered rib injures in successive game is 1/ 2 weeks away from being able to return.

Ebbw Sign Canadian International Paul Ciulini
With a serious current  injury crisis in the second row, the Steelmen have  signed Canadian International lock, Paul Cuilini, following discussions with Steelmen favourite and current Canadian National Coach, Kingsley Jones. Canada will be playing in a World Cup play off in France in the next few weeks and Paul, who has 8 caps to his name, was unlucky not to make the cut for the squad. Kingsley was keen to have him close at hand and battle hardened in case of injury and Paul will be with us for the next few games. The 23 year old, 6ft 5” and 20st second row is a timely arrival and trained with the squad on Tuesday evening in the rain and high winds as a welcome to Blaenau Gwent.
Coach Greg Woods and Chairman Jon Jones would like to take the opportunity to thank Kingsley, the Canadian RFU and its staff for agreeing the move and acting with speed and diligence to make Paul available for selection.

As well as refereeing Friday night’s gargantuan, top-of-the-table clash between Ebbw and Merthyr, Nigel Owens managed to fit in another appointment. At half time, and much to the delight of the young players, he took charge of a demonstration match involving Ebbw Vale Steelers Under 7s/8s.

Many thanks to Mr Owens for doing this, and for not minding having to hurry off for his half time cuppa! In a tweet on Saturday morning, Nigel said, “Well done both @evrfc and @RFCMerthyr for playing a good hard game last night. Really enjoyed reffing it BUT am sorry lads, the highlight of the night for me was refereeing the U7s tag match at half time. Well done all involved.”

Legend.

Following Saturday’s humdinger at Pontypridd, focus switches to Friday night and the visit of Merthyr, one place and two points above Ebbw at the top of the Principality Premiership.

It’s live on TV but you’ll really want to be there in person!

It was with a great deal of sadness that we learned of the death of Will Skyrme, a fine prop forward who joined  us in 1973 from Gwernyfed RFC – one of many great Breconshire players to have done so over the years.
Will played in the red, green and white of Ebbw Vale for six years and, in that time, propped against some of the best in Britain. He was devoted to Gwernyfed, a club with a very strong connection with Ebbw Vale. We send our condolences to Will’s family and friends, and to everyone at Gwernyfed RFC.

The funeral service will take place this Friday at 1pm at Llanfilo Church, in the village of Llanfilo, Brecon, Powys LD3 0RD.

The comeback kings went top of the league with another resurrection special at the Gnoll on Saturday.

You can read about it in Welsh and English here.

BBC Wales Scrum V has spent the week catching up with some well known Steelmen. You can watch the features they’ve done on Ronny Kynes here (with a wonderful supporting Cameo performance), and Ashley Sweet, here.