Notes of the Dorset Forum Meeting Monday, 14thSeptember, 2015 @ Bournemouth RFC

Chair: Dawn Miller

Administrator / Secretary: Graham Leveridge

Attendance

Dave Wookey (D & W), Laith Sabih (Bour), Greg Pike (Bour), Melanie Moriarty (Swans), John Constable(D & W & Swans), Steve Hunter (Wey & P),Nick Elbourne (Wimb), Richard Parry (Wim) John Lambourn (Dorch), Simon Crawford (Oaks), Chris Burton (RFU), St.John Coley (DPP), Rob Whitham (Wimb)

Apologies Julian Hussey (Bridport) Guy Furner (Brid),Kerrie Spence-Grime (Bland), Kerrie Kempster (Bland), Barry Rodd (Poole), James Dimmack (ND)

U15s and U16s Cup Issues

Dave W reminded everybody that this year’s U15s and U16s D&W Cup competitions will follow the format of last year’s U16s competition, there will be an initial pools section, followed by Cup and Plate semi-finals and finals.

Some concerns were raised about the relative strength of some of the pools compared to others, Dave W reiterated that they were drawn based on trying to minimise the distances travelled by each Club.

If a consensus can be made by the D&W Clubs, then for next year’s completions, the pools may be drawn on a seeding basis instead.

U13s and U14s Cups

The 2015/2016 match cards are now available on the D&W website.

Regarding bad weather cancellations, all clubs are reminded to let Dave W, Dawn M and Graham L know as soon as possible.

Graham L will contact any appointed referees to inform them of any cancellations.

If no D&W referee is available for a match then it is the home side’s responsibility to supply one.

Membership cards – All clubs should be uploading photos onto the RFU GMS of their youth players, this replaces the old fashion passport photo being stuck on a membership card, these then can then be printed as and when required for id purposes for Cup matches/festivals etc.

U5s and U6s

No child can play against another team until they reach their 6th birthday.

Also, there should be a ratio of at least 1 supervisory adult to 4 children, if, say, a parent regularly counts as one of your four then they may also have the DBS checked.

For further details see the safeguarding toolkit on the RFU website.

DBS Checks

Quick reminder that all coaches, managers and first aiders require up to date DBS checks, youth registrars should be able to provide a list of any person that currently holds one of the above roles but no current DBS certificate.

Club audits and outstanding information
A quick reminder from Dave W that a lot clubs audited last year have still not supplied all information required, please chase up.
Main items outstanding are full lists of volunteers, DBS renewals etc.
Safeguarding
When clubs are thinking of reporting a safeguarding issue to the RFU, firstly please ensure it warrants reporting and isn’t just a case of bad practice, that should be dealt with by the club, for example a one off occurrence of a coach shouting at a child, we all have bad days, as opposed to a coach regularly shouting at children, this should be reported.
When making a report, please ensure Dave Harris is also informed when or preferably before the report is made.
RFU GMS
It would appear that a lot clubs still don’t have full and up to date information on the GMS.
This has caused delays with producing this year’s D&W handbook as many of the club details were not easily available from the GMS.
It was suggested that next year any club not up to date should be named and shamed or their details just not included in the handbook, however it is hoped we don’t get to this.
Regarding GMS ‘housekeeping’ there is a deadline for all clubs of 3rd May 2016 when they will be expected to be fully up to date.
Also, with respect to U15s and U16s cup competitions, all registered players with a club are expected to have played in at least one game, so if any clubs still have ex-players registered, now is the time to deregister them, checks will be made against the GMS with the match cards handed in to ensure all registered players have participated in a match and questions will be asked where it appears a registered player has not played in a game.
Girls Rugby
Girls rugby is now run at U13s, U15s and U18s.
The main problem in retaining girls in the game is finding the right coaches and as there are so few teams, the distance they have to travel to play games.
The RFU is to run a big campaign in schools to try and get more girls interested in playing, should any clubs be interested in being involved in this then please contact D&Ws.
2015/2016 DPP
We were fortunate to have St.John Coley in the house and the main points discussed were:
Last year clubs feedback – As yet St.John as only received feedback from one club, if any other clubs have comments please e-mail them to him
All nomination forms are now on the D&W website, they need to be downloaded, completed and e-mailed to St.John at latest a week before the respective age group trial.
For U13s, there are guidelines on the website on how many players each respective club is expected to send to the trial days. These are only guidelines, if clubs, who, say, have only been allocated three players, based on last year’s U12s Dorset & Wilts Cup results, feel that a player they have should go, but would mean sending four instead of three, you can still send them and if a team has been allocated, say, twelve players, but may only think they have, say, ten players that should go, that’s fine as well.
If anybody has a query on their player allocation, please contact St.John.
It was noted from last year’s trialists that 60% were born between September and Christmas and only 20% born in the last third of the year (i.e. May to August).
Would coaches, when making their selections, please take into account that some of their younger players may be just as well suited for DPP as their older players, but not quite at their level yet.
DPP is looking for potential and at the moment it appears if you are a player born after Christmas you have a lot less chance of being included in the DPP than , this can’t be right.
The published DPP days may be affected by the World Cup, updates, if necessary, will be made available to clubs.
St.John will be contacting clubs to see if any of their junior age coaches would like to join in on the afternoon sessions, after their own Sunday morning games/training session, so they can also get a better idea of what is going on at the DPP days.
Training courses
Just a quick reminder to clubs that upcoming training courses can be found on the D&W website.
Also, North Dorset will soon be holding a ‘Play it Safe’ safeguarding course, for anybody interested to attend, also, clubs with enough interest will also be able to hold their own safeguarding courses and it is highly recommended that as many club volunteers as possible attend a safeguarding course.
Also, for 2015/2016, for all accredited clubs, D&W will cover 50% of all coaches and referees courses, this is for all courses subsequent to 01 September 2015 and clubs should contact D&W Treasurer, John Palmer, regarding claiming a contribution from D&W.
Transfer etiquette
Nick E bought up the fact that the Wiltshire clubs are striving to encourage parents and players to join the closest club to them and if a player is looking to transfer to encourage the clubs to discuss with the parents and player why the player wants to transfer.
Feedback to D&W on this may be able to help them pin point any potential problems a club may have and any help they may need.
At junior level, the fear is that we may end up with one, two or even three super teams, but they will have no other local teams to play.
Recruitment of County age group manager
Laith S has asked clubs to ask any of their managers whether they would be also willing to consider managing one of the County age groups.If anybody is interested please contact Laith, as there is currently a good opportunity for them to shadow one of the current managers to get a good idea of what is involved in managing a County team.
Any other business
The hand off rule at U13s level is causing confusion, there does not appear to be any regulation that stops U13s handing off to the face, however this could be considered as dangerous play at this age group by referees.
It is recommended that if there is any confusion, that coaches should discuss with the referee before the game starts how he/she will interpret the hand off rule.
It was noted that Somerset have a fixture exchange website for any clubs looking to fill their fixture list.
Also, unknown to most Dorset fixtures secretaries, D&W also have their own fixture exchange website, the consensus seemed to be that most Dorset clubs were happy with the current situation of banging out e-mails to their respective colleagues when looking for fixtures.
Date and Venue of next meeting
Will be in January 2016, but actual date and venue yet to be decided.
Meeting duly closed at about 9PM.