Rugby....In Spain?? You sure?

jamesbondings

As some of you lads here may be aware, I am off to Spain for erasmus.
Luckily i have picked a college in the north of Spain with a team nearby.

Pending college repeats results, I have purchased flights and will be making tracks this Sunday. For those interested I will be penning a rugby diary so to speak. My flights are booked bags are packed (with all my rugby gear all clean and ready to go) and i hope to go to the first training session this week.

The lads in the club have been onto me and insisted they help me find accommodation on Monday but i hope to have something sorted before then!

Anyways ill keep ye posted lads. Photos too!

James

Leinster13

What club are you playing for? I'm based in Madrid, and I've trained u12 and 14 here at a club and my son is playing for the u-16s this year. We've often gone on trips to the north with the kids. Be interesting to see what you think the differences in standards, training etc. are. Good luck!!!!

jamesbondings

Leinster13 wrote: »

What club are you playing for? I'm based in Madrid, and I've trained u12 and 14 here at a club and my son is playing for the u-16s this year. We've often gone on trips to the north th the kids. Be interesting to see what you think the differences in standards, training etc. are. Good luck!!!!

I'm going to be playing with Gazteidi Rugby Taldea in vitoria gasteiz...

I have no idea the standard but I would assume (perhaps naively) that it would be similar to the j5s or there abouts. Thus suits as that's the standard I partake in. However this may not even be the case. theyall be very good and the standard could be of a j1 level.

salmocab

I played a match against a traveling team from spain a few months ago and they were a good deal better than j5, easily j2 standard and they had been drinking in England and Wales for 5 days before they played us, on the up side they were great craic and stayed boozing in our clubhouse till the wee hours. Good luck with it.

.ak

jamesbondings wrote: »

I'm going to be playing with Gazteidi Rugby Taldea in vitoria gasteiz...

I have no idea the standard but I would assume (perhaps naively) that it would be similar to the j5s or there abouts. Thus suits as that's the standard I partake in. However this may not even be the case. theyall be very good and the standard could be of a j1 level.

You have to learn how to pass sooner or later, may as well be now.

LeinsterDub

.ak wrote: »

You have to learn how to pass sooner or later, may as well be now.

Why pass when there is someone to run into ....

Big Nelly

Was over in Barcelona about a year ago, middle of Jan so was nippy to say the least. Got the old Red bus tour and was surprised when passing part of the city there was about 10-15 pitch's under the road. Now of course there was a few soccer games on but was surprised to see 3 rugby match's been played on the pitch's. Was only passing so didn't get to watch much but was full 15 and subs available for each of the match's.....

jamesbondings

Big Nelly wrote: »

Was over in Barcelona about a year ago, middle of Jan so was nippy to say the least. Got the old Red bus tour and was surprised when passing part of the city there was about 10-15 pitch's under the road. Now of course there was a few soccer games on but was surprised to see 3 rugby match's been played on the pitch's. Was only passing so didn't get to watch much but was full 15 and subs available for each of the match's.....

From what I can gather rugby is quite big up north with loads of leagues. The team I will be playing with seem to also run a league or team for kids with down syndrome too! They also have a ladies team and a full underage setup.
The rugby club also has a fully equipped gym including 2 swimming pools........

.ak

... so what you're saying is we should organise our tour to there this year?

mfceiling

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Why pass when there is someone to run into ....

Stephen ferris, is that you?

jamesbondings

.ak wrote: »

... so what you're saying is we should organise our tour to there this year?

I have had this with the powers that be in the club, they stalled on it (already sorted another club in the UK, which i will see you at!) so not this year perhaps the following year!

.ak

I'll keep you to that, I won't be happy until I can drink sangria on the sidelines during a match.

Leinster13

Looks like you're in Vitoria, nice enough town, went with the kids to play some matches there but at the last minute we ended up playing in another town, something which happens quite frequently in the underage rugby here - organisation not being the strong point of Spanish kids rugby. There's a lot of rugby in the Basque country and the top Basque teams would be regularly in the Spanish first division (Division of Honour). Basques would normally have a reputation for being pretty tough, probably forward-dominated rugby. Gaztedi were in the playoffs to get into the Spanish second division last year, but didn't make it, so the level might not be great but you might end up learning some Basque too, although looks like an impossible language to me. I'd say you'll have a good year though.

sydneybound

Sorry to hijack this thread after reading it I wondered how the Spanish national team isn’t a little bit stronger.

They seem to have a decent(ish) domestic structure with the Division de Honor most teams based in the Basque country then have a division below that with three groups in the North, East and South. So there is a fair bit of rugby played. I thought they would have been doing better in the European Nations Cup and getting the better of Russia and Romania. It mightn’t be very glamorous but the thought of maybe playing in a World Cup for some lads on the French side of the boarder would attract them to playing for Spain

It would be interesting if they entered a Basque country team and include Bayonne and Biarritz and played home games in the Anoeta Stadium.

Leinster13

I think the answer as to why Spain isn't doing better is in the way rugby for kids is organised. No schools (or very, very few, some of the foreign schools) play rugby. So kids come to rugby through the clubs. An example of how the rugby works in clubs is the club I've been involved with in Madrid since my son started playing 6 years ago. Kids teams in Spain are divided every 2 years (under 8, 10, 12 etc) because there weren't enough kids to field a team per year, although this has definitely changed, there are normally enough kids in most clubs in Madrid to have a team per year but they still put 2 years together with horrific differences in size between the youngest and the oldest kids.
Under 8s would "train" once a week. I say "train" because when he started there seemed to be no emphasis on learning the basic skills of passing/tackling. They used to play bulldog a lot. When he got to the under 10s he trained on Thursday evenings then played a match on Saturdays. Training seemed to consist of lots of bulldog and then mini matches where the biggest kid would get the ball and run through the other kids time after time. In the matches the coaches would be shouting "tackle, tackle", something which used to make me want to shout at them. "teach them how to tackle first!!" Under 12 train twice a week, same kind of training sessions.
In my son's second year at under 12 I actually took over the training of the kids and had 3 years with them. I'm no Joe Schmit but I tried to get them practising passing and tackling and introduced them to the concept of rucking, something they hadn't been aware of. I stayed with the kids for 3 years and we got some pretty good results considering numbers etc. Our team would have been considered one of the weaker ones in Madrid for the age group and now we are one of the stronger teams, reaching Madrid finals and winning tournaments.
Anyway, enough of blowing my own trumpet. This summer my son went over to the Leinster school of excellence and had a great time, but could see immediately the difference in intensity and speed. He was mixing with kids from schools rugby in Leinster who I suppose train in an organised fashion three-four times a week, who learn about nutrition, strength exercises and who are exposed to rugby continually. This compared to Spain with twice weekly training sessions on often rock hard pitches where his team could be training on a 1/4 of a pitch under dodgy lights where they can't even see the ball. Also if kids have homework, they very often just don't turn up which makes preparing squads for matches next to impossible. Add to that that kids who play rugby are often the ones who haven't made it in soccer or basketball (obviously the top sports in schools here) and who often aren't the most athletic types to start with, then you can see how difficult it can be for the level of rugby to improve here.
Hope that isn't a rant, but it can be a bit infuriating being involved in rugby in Spain.

jamesbondings

Leinster13 wrote: »

Looks like you're in Vitoria, nice enough town, went with the kids to play some matches there but at the last minute we ended up playing in another town, something which happens quite frequently in the underage rugby here - organisation not being the strong point of Spanish kids rugby. There's a lot of rugby in the Basque country and the top Basque teams would be regularly in the Spanish first division (Division of Honour). Basques would normally have a reputation for being pretty tough, probably forward-dominated rugby. Gaztedi were in the playoffs to get into the Spanish second division last year, but didn't make it, so the level might not be great but you might end up learning some Basque too, although looks like an impossible language to me. I'd say you'll have a good year though.

Apologies, i thought i had mentioned where i was going! Yep am headed to Vitoria, im lucky i already have a tiny bit of basque from my mates in bilbao, but like you it makes no sense to me! I plan on travelling around quite a bit most of the basque region is on my list including Southern France.

The set up seems to be unreal for rugby however their website is shockingly poor. I wonder do the college have a rugby club too? I thought i saw somewhere that they did but who knows what i read haha

chippers

Best of luck in your adventures! I played for three years in the Madrid and had a great time. I was surprised that Madrid alone has four adult leagues of about 12 teams each - the top league being about J1 standard. Rugby up north is a much higher standard. We went on tour up to Navarra and got a pasting. Huge tough fellas! As someone else mentioned the Division of Honour is a much higher standard - semi pro level, a good few foreigners would be involved at this level and it is serious rugby.

The one big difference I did notice is the standard of coaching is much lower. I can't comment on all teams but it appeared that the spanish guys who played rugby were mad into it but the level of coaching was sub standard.

Have a great time, you will love 'el tercer tiempo'. They know how to eat and drink in the north!

jamesbondings

And so it begins....

Bags en route to the aircraft pint in hand... Charging the tablet in the pub for some in flight entertainment.... Flight leaving in an hour...

Bricking it about moving to a foreign country on my own. Leaving the missus behind but tis only a year! I am extremely excited and that out weighs the fear if I'm honest.....

Next time I post I will be a player in a Spanish league!
(really hope I passed my repeats otherwise this thread could be very short!)

jamesbondings

ok. well that was interesting to say the least.

Im still very confused as to what that was, i feel (may not be entirely true) that the coach wasnt really sure himself what was going on.....the lads must have done over 20 laps of the pitch....i stopped after two...there just didnt seem to be much if any structure.

They run alot, but i found out later that their style of play is quickly....so it makes sense for them to train the way they do but they dont check for numbers out wide or look for goodlines to run. Im so tired even the next day!

Thursday is the next session, hopefully it goes better than that last night.

salmocab

Bad coaching, running around with no structure, it is j5 rugby.

jamesbondings

You wouldnt mind bad coaching, but there is no need for near 20 laps or more, EVER.....we did maybe two drills which werent very effective, and instead of stopping to explain where people were going wrong they just continued, i said to they guy who told me they play quickly as to catch the opponent on the hop,, but if you slowed it down you can get it out wide and start again moving slowly up the pitch ,no they want to break the line every time and if they dont and turn over the ball there is no defense......

Also for some unknown reason the balls are sh1te, like they are brand new they are just useless. However the area the club is in is unreal,its in a public park, with an outdoor velodrome, 3 swimming pools, tennis courts, paddle courts fronton courts......the list goes on but most important, it has a bar!

Leinster13

Yep, the Spanish like their laps!!!! And the quality of the training might be very suspect. My son started under-16 training on Saturday. Went along to watch yesterday. 25 minutes of touch rugby while the head coach of the 16s chatted to the other coaches and explained what they were going to be doing that day, while the kids were on their own. No active stretching or real warm-up. This was followed by three drills which didn't seem to do that much and that was about it...
In terms of facilities the clubs often use the local town's sports hall facilities which can be great.
It'll be interesting to see how it goes on Thursday. Keep us posted!!

jamesbondings

Will do!

They assured me this was only pre season so hopefully it picks up. The coach did say one of the drills were about learning to fall and tackle in the correct way (which i agree is vital), this led me to believe there were relative newcomers to the game, however he didnt go on to explain how they should have been done. (knees hip shoulder).

They and the opposition may be fit, but surely they cant expect to do well just by running laps, no lineouts, no scrums, no backs and forwards work outs, just laps, two drills and home. Now those of you who know me personally will agree the laps will only do me good, however i walked 5km there so that was a good enough warm up and workout for me however with games coming up the week after next i struggle to see how laps are more important than lineout calls and set pieces etc

.ak

So..... You're not going to learn to pass the ball after all? :pac:

Winters

Thanks for the updates, interesting to get a little insight into rugby in other countries.

Keep em coming and good luck with your year out. I lived in Madrid for a while and loved it.

jamesbondings

Latest Update.....

So the league begins next week! Now they tell me I have to get a transfer, no idea how to do it but i will ring my home club on Monday to find out!
Training is ehm, tough....40 mins warm up....and the warm up consisted solely of running, no apparent reason and also no ball work during this time. But i have noticed a marked improvement in my fitness even in 4 sessions (day one i only managed 2 laps, yesterday 4 and a half!) But of course the lads did about twenty more than me!And that's no exaggeration! The problem is they destroy themselves in the warm up and then struggle to use their heads in the drills.....(because they are physically tired and cant possibly focused!)

The offload seems to be their ONLY plan of attack and of course they don't look where they pass it....I found myself getting very frustrated last night at training. I wanted to tell the players to use their heads look for space and take the ball into contact and ruck over and i wanted to tell the coaches that there is no need for the offload so much! But as the new guy ill wait till they all know me and all that jazz. I pushed myself as far as i could last night, ended up vomiting everywhere on the pitch......The ladies team (training on the other half of the pitch) didn't find it funny but i did hahaha i just spewed and continued, and if im totally honest i felt far better training after puking than before!

For some reason we seem to be having some sort of heat wave, I cant cope, seriously before we even started i was sweating bucket loads! Also simple things like rucking, they don't know how, or they just don't use their heads! They commit far too many and leave gaps all over the shop, no pillars or posts. They all seem to think they know what they are doing but i just wanna kick them up the hole tell them get out of the ruck, the ball is lost defend yada yada yada, but its not my place! I thought training was to tighten up all these weaknesses but I cant see how it will be fixed by next weekend not to mention the fact we haven't touched on scrums/line-outs etc......

As an aside, sorry for not updating this more regularly however the internet is the worst i have ever seen, they still use adsl and it makes no sense i never have more than one bar on the laptop on no bars on the phone!

James

salmocab

Hopefully your opposition have a similar training regime and you might look like quite the superstar

Leinster13

Sounds like you're having fun.... Glad to hear that not practising scrums and line outs is not confined to my son's under 16 team here in Madrid. They haven't practiced a single scrum or line out in training but they've played two matches so far. Lost both by a lot, first match didn't win a single scrum or line out until the last five minutes, only won the scrums in the second match because they had decided on uncontested scrums. With a bit of luck your opponents won't have practised scrums either... Rugby in Spain....

croket

The standard of rugby in Spain is quite low...
And the national team select often french players with a spanish grandfather or a NZ/Eng/SA guy who played more than 3 years in Spain.

I know if he wasn't capped by Ireland, Jordi Murphy could play for Spain, he is born in Barcelona

jamesbondings

This is true croket, one of my lecturers is close family friends apparently all fluent in spanish and always speak with him in spanish! Mental....

Anywho, the poop has hit the fan!!

The league kicked off last weekend and being quite lazy in terms of organizing a transfer (aka i didn't do it haha) I was unable to play....
Thats fine says I, what else have I to do in order to play next weekend i says........get the transfer...ok cool what else, eh pay your subs. So the obvious question is how much.............

The words he said next broke my heart and nearly gave me a heart attack at the same time! 350 quid!!!!!
I inquired where to send the direct debit mandate etc (obviously this price is outrageous but sure hey i need to play rugby this year!) Direct debit he asks....oh no you have to pay that up front before you will be allowed play......

No wonder the uptake in rugby here is so poor, only the working can afford it! If they lowered their subs there would be far more students and youths taking up the game....I am to have a meeting tomorrow night to discuss this with the management but if nothing can be done rugby will have to be dropped, i will never have 350 spare, 50 euro a month i can muster (begrudgingly i must admit) but 350 upfront .....scandalous, i should charge them for my "knowledge" of the sport hahahaha.....

tldr, too much money to play in spain, might tell them im a semi pro get a contract and charge them.....college rugby is on though it turns out, its 7s, fun!

just as an aside 350 here, is nearly 2 months rent for me!

.ak

Upfront is a bit mad Ted. Even 50/50 would be better.

Teferi

Jaysus, that seems a lot altogether. Do you know where that money is going? Often times insurance companies can be hesitant to insure a sport they are not familiar with, especially contact sports like rugby, yank football etc. Could it be high premiums?

jamesbondings

.ak wrote: »

Upfront is a bit mad Ted. Even 50/50 would be better.

I must ask tomorrow what this covers, i really hope they dont say coaching etc i will end up laughing at them, but even 175 upfront i will have to save for 2-3 weeks to get that! ontop of putting money by for the aul rent and bills......

id easily pay it in quarters but with alot of expensive things coming up like one trip home next week and another the following week if money allows i cant see them getting anything out of me for 2-3 weeks ......why they didnt tell me all this when i arrived i have no idea, and im a little annoyed about it to be honest....

eg a mate in college plays for pamplona....subs... 120 a year for a student....id spend too much travelling to get there to train and play matches but would consider it as they have a direct debit of a tenner a month!

jamesbondings

Teferi wrote: »

Jaysus, that seems a lot altogether. Do you know where that money is going? Often times insurance companies can be hesitant to insure a sport they are not familiar with, especially contact sports like rugby, yank football etc. Could it be high premiums?

This is a good point but it pisses me right off, they have told me i have to get club insurance....so now i have my ehic (european health insurance card) erasmus insurance policy AND club policy......i have no interest in paying again as i informed my insurance i would be playing rugby over here thus my premium doubled!

Leinster13

350 in Spain is a normal enough price. Here in Madrid in my club the kids (from under 6 up) have paid that the last couple of years, for some reason they've dropped it to 300 this season. My club does let you pay in installments though, I think 100 X 3. It's the famous "ficha" that everybody pays which includes obligatory insurance and club costs. Some clubs give you the gear free with the ficha, mine doesn't and charges 57 euro for one jersey, socks and shorts. We never get a breakdown of this ficha charge, so god knows what they do with it. Oh and if the kids go on a trip anywhere out of Madrid, that is extra too. For some reason it always seems to be 135 euros, regardless of whether they travel for 6 hours or 2 hours, or if they stay one night or two. Again, no breakdown of costs. It's true that rugby does attract a lot of "pijos" (rich, conservative people) in Madrid, and the costs are probably part of the reason. Maybe have a chat with them and see if you can get them to let you pay in installments...
Good luck!!!!

jamesbondings

subs for me last year were 90 euro or there abouts.....paid an extra 250 and went on tour.......

no wonder spanish rugby isnt progressing it is too exclusive......yea i think a good accountant/business head could lower all the "costs" and make it more accessible

dont get me wrong the people are bang on, but they price too many people out of the sport....

eg the local football team....90 euro a year!!

stephen_n

jamesbondings wrote: »

subs for me last year were 90 euro

Assume that's a student rate?

jamesbondings

yep but even still i think fully paid was only 150 or there abouts......

stephen_n

jamesbondings wrote: »

yep but even still i think fully paid was only 150 or there abouts......

Oh yeah, 350 is high, mines 210 this year and tbh that's a bit high I reckon.

salmocab

clubs always pedal out the 'its 110 per player for the irfu insurance, although I suspect they have done a simple 'price of team insurance divided by 15' sum. So if you pay 210 and they pay out 110 then 100 euro for the club is reasonable. 350 just sounds ridiculos.

stephen_n

salmocab wrote: »

clubs always pedal out the 'its 110 per player for the irfu insurance, although I suspect they have done a simple 'price of team insurance divided by 15' sum. So if you pay 210 and they pay out 110 then 100 euro for the club is reasonable. 350 just sounds ridiculos.

Yeah I doubt there is any club here charging that sort of money here and in fairness the 210 includes 50 credit for the bar, so it's really 160.

LeinsterDub

Insurance in Ireland is quite cheap as the irfu have a group rate negotiated

LeinsterDub

salmocab wrote: »

clubs always pedal out the 'its 110 per player for the irfu insurance, although I suspect they have done a simple 'price of team insurance divided by 15' sum. So if you pay 210 and they pay out 110 then 100 euro for the club is reasonable. 350 just sounds ridiculos.

Irfu insurance for adult teams, underage are free
3500 per team /15 = 233
3500 per team /30 = 116
And that's the cheapest, crappie insurance without building cover and other stuff.

Public liability 3500 for a 1 team club.

pickarooney

A years subs + licence + insurance is €100 for me in France.
It's about twice that for the kids.

sydneybound

So how is it going out in Spain? I'm interested to hear about the quality of the league and rugby in the country.

Hope you got the insurance fees sorted