Consider the true meaning of rugby and how it fosters friendships. The first image that may come to mind is the athletes, coaches, management and administrators on the team forming close friendships that could be life lasting. What may not be first to come to your mind is the thousands of rugby relationships around the world that are developed on social media, and many of these can be attributed to #rugbyunited (RU).
The founders of RU, Trevor Large and Rich Church-Keen, provided me with insight as to how it was founded, what its purpose is, and its place in the world of rugby. RU is a social media network run by fans, for fans. It links up over 250,000 people on social media, mostly through Twitter, who all love and support rugby with the aim of fans being able to interact with like minded people, literally across the world.
The common interest of rugby has a unique force of attraction, regardless of where people are located in the world. Trevor summarized their purpose as, “We aim to unite everyone in their love of rugby.” The RU account is a platform for fellow rugby loving people to share friendly rugby banter. “As RU is about users getting involved, and we have a global audience, you’ll find activity on #rugbyunited literally 24 hours a day, 7 days a week,” said Trevor.
The roots of #rugbyunited stem from “an attempt to support Gloucester Rugby in their play off semi-final against Saracens on Sunday 15th May 2011” (http://www.rugbyunited.info). This is when RU founders, Rich and Trevor met.
They were inspired to start RU during early 2011. Trevor said, “I started coming across more and more fans on Twitter who supported Gloucester Rugby, the team I support. We started interacting and it was amazing to be talking to people about the club in such an open, public forum. During the RWC2011, I started seeing more and more rugby tweets as people discussed the RWC games, players and teams.”
Talking to supporters of other clubs and countries was something Trevor and Rich really enjoyed, and after the RWC finished, fans still talked to each other about rugby, their club, and regions. Rugby fans seemed to have this “united” spirit about the game, the values and everything else associated with sport. It was during late 2011 that Trevor and Rich started thinking about creating one common place on social media for rugby fans globally.
At that time, it was clear that rugby fans on social media loved interacting with each other; there was this real “united” feel about it. On the 23rd December 2011, the first tweets went out with the #rugbyunited hashtag on them with the initial idea of encouraging rugby fans to “follow back” each other, meaning individuals would grow their own networks of rugby fans. Trevor explained, “Anyone using #rugbyunited as a hashtag would be followed, and, in turn they would follow back Rugby United. This has evolved over time as the accounts grew, and they no longer encourage everyone to follow each other back, although many rugby fans still do!”
In September 2012, nearly a year after RU began, they started exploring the idea of setting up individual club and country accounts. By the end of 2012, RU had accounts covering the top 50 IRB ranked nations, along with accounts for the English Premiership, English Championship, Pro12, and selected TOP14 accounts.
When I first discovered #rugbyunited at the end of 2014, it was always exciting to find a “new” RU account that I hadn’t chatted to yet, and I’m still discovering more! According to RU supporter, Andrew Lone, “I found #rugbyunited about three years ago and love the rugby banter and meeting rugby minded people like myself.” If there is a rugby-playing country or club that does not have an account, Trevor and Rich are open to hear from you to discuss creating one.
There is no other rugby network in the world that currently exists with the family type of relationship encountered by RU members. RU has been really lucky that so many people enjoy what they have created, which has allowed them to grow to the size they are. There are many official and unofficial supporters’ clubs that exist, but Trevor believes that “we are the only organisation who is focused on the sport as a whole and joins up all the supporters.”
RU has an exciting future ahead, especially in 2015, with the Six Nations and Super Rugby 15 just starting. Beginning in April, RU will be gearing up towards the Rugby World Cup, which is being held in England starting in September. They have a few ideas that they are working on, which everyone is eager to hear about. Shortly after the Rugby World Cup it will be their four year anniversary, followed by rugby being at the Olympics for the very first time in 2016!
With rugby growing as quickly as it is across the globe, RU hopes the sport continues attracting players and fans who create this unique family feeling which makes rugby truly united.
You can follow #rugbyunited on Twitter and enjoy discovering their other accounts around the world. Trevor’s Twitter handle is @trevorlarge and Rich’s is @RichC_K and more info can be found on http://www.rugbyunited.info where there is also a list of their accounts.
To be continued in Part II with more detail about #rugbyunited accounts…
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