Centre of Rugby Excellence
STAR, Ipoh and SDAR Seremban, two of Malaysia’s leading rugby schools, have invited three top England Schools National Rugby Coaches to deliver clinics to coaches and students at SDAR and STAR from 3rd to 9th April. The clinics are the first stage in establishing regional Rugby Centres of Excellence for schools in North and South Malaysia.
The coaching clinics and Centres of Excellence Programmes are being developed with the co-operation of project consultants Big Blue Link Sdn Bhd as a pilot project using rugby as a tool to create International Partnerships between Malaysian and UK schools under the Ministry of Education’s High Performance Schools Programme. The Programmes are being run with the co-operation of the Malaysian Rugby Union in support of the development of rugby for youth in schools and being funded wholly by Ministry of Youth and Sports.
The England Schools coaches will also provide materials for the creation of rugby resource centres at SDAR and STAR for Malaysian schools. SDAR and STAR have invited coaches and students from other schools to attend the clinics as part of their mission to lead the development of schools rugby in Malaysia.
The England Rugby Football Schools Union (RFSU) coaches; Michael Pyrgos, Stephen Shortland and Andrew Marriott are coaches and selectors for the England National Schools Under 16 team and are also coaches at two of England’s top rugby schools, Bryanston School, Dorset and Wellington College, Berkshire.
The week long Centre of Excellence Programme will finish on Saturday 9th April at STAR with the first of what will become an annual friendly match between SDAR and STAR for the ‘Brotherhood Shield’.
(Press release sent to Ministry Youth and Sports dated 31st March 2011)