My Experience With Rugby by Danny Mueller
My Experience with rugby started the same as many kids in America who play rugby, by watching my dad play. After a long hiatus since the end of college, my dad started playing Rugby again in 2008 for Worcester. Soon after he started playing, I started playing flag rugby for Worcester.
This system lasted from about the time I was 5 until I was 12. Around the time I started playing full on proper tackle Rugby sevens in middle school, the Bay State Games created a tournament for rugby sevens and the Wolfhounds started hosting a younger division in their ‘Beanpot’ Sevens Tournament. The most important memory of middle school rugby and my first lesson about competition comes from my first Bay State Games tournament, where the team that I captained played in the tournament finals match. The finals match remains an important memory to me for 2 reasons, the first reason is that it's the last time i played with my cousins -who’s dad and mine played together in college, More importantly however is that it's the first time I ever truly felt completely outplayed by my counterpart at scrumhalf, and we would go on to lose that game by a cricket score. Losing that match made me frustrated and as our team's captain I felt silly afterwards, but it taught me a lot of lessons and the next year we went back to the tournament and righted the wrongs of the previous year in the finals against the team that bested us. In that first tournament we also played against a new team, the “Wrentham Barbarians' ' and while i didnt know it at the time, that club would be my home for the duration of my high school career.
That winter I went to a clinic in Weymouth, and not only was I surprised by the amount of people my age that played rugby, but I also met many people there that would one day be some of my longest friends from rugby. Once I reached Freshman year of high school after another summer playing for Worcester, I found that the club I had played for all my life could not field a team for my age group due to a lack of numbers. This put me at a crossroads as there were no other teams in central Massachusetts that I could play for. I explored my options and the nearest team was an hour away in Wrentham. While moving to a new team was a new experience, I adjusted quickly and began to feel at home with my new team. My first year with my new team was a great success and a strong bond was formed between everyone, there was a great chemistry on that first Wrentham team I played on. It was also at this time that Rugby really became widespread in New England. There was now a full summer schedule of tournaments, and we were playing Teams from Newport, Rhode Island to Manchester, New Hampshire. We were very competitive that year, we won a tournament and were on tier with Mystic and the Wolfhounds year.
After that summer I sustained an injury during the fall at a tryout and that winter, the Covid 19 pandemic started so apart for touch rugby that summer 2020 was the first time in 10 years that I couldn't play rugby for an extended period of time and it negatively impacted me to a large extent. Before that I had not realized how much rugby affected my life in a positive way and it gave me a newfound appreciation that I still hold with me.
Due to the pandemic, my high school rugby career was limited but I played whenever possible. This did limit the exposure I would have had with college opportunities I may have had here in the US These considerations led me to apply to The University of Edinburgh in the fall of my senior year, and in April I made the decision to travel across the Atlantic ocean to Study there.
That summer I played my final season of high school rugby, and while many of the teammates I previously played with had aged out of the program and went off to college, I used this season as an opportunity to fully embrace my role of captain to teach and mentor some of the less experienced players on the team while I recovered from a shoulder injury for most of the season, that I sustained while playing a 15s game that spring. Once I returned to the field in time for the last tournament of the season, I played with a newfound commitment to my teammates and we won the bronze medal game, where I played against an old friend, after the game we both talked about what a pleasure it was to play against each other.
When I did go off to University in Scotland, I felt a major culture shock. For the first time in my life rugby was everywhere and I was now the most inexperienced member of my team. After considering playing for an Intramural team, I chose to play for The Edinburgh University Rugby Football Club 4s team. After a semester of late night practices, even later socials, watching a Scotland game at Murrayfield with my father, a position change,and my acclimation which was made smoother from guidance by our teams welfare secretary, I was Finally selected to play in a match against my high school coach’s Alma Mater, Heriot Watt University. While I didn't play my best in that game, I got my feet wet playing in a true BUCs league game, and after that I was selected to play in three more games my second semester. My second semester also solidified the bond between me and my now 3 best friends: a Scottish second year player and my flatmate next year Tom, another first year named Alfie from Middlesbrough in England, and a second year student but first year player Kaleb from Glasgow. Being the only American on our team definitely made me stick out but because of rugby being how it is, I had no trouble befriending them. This last semester was unforgettable, The EURFC 4s won both the League and the Cup earning us a promotion, and Me, Alfie and Kaleb all earned our club ties in an unforgettable social event that we still talk about.
Currently, I am back in the states anticipating my second year of University this fall the rugby that comes with it, and looking at where I am now I don't know where I would be without this amazing Game and the opportunities that it gave me by playing it.
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