On Wednesday, 16 April, kick off 6.30pm at Raeburn Place, a select BATs U18 team will play Merchiston Castle School – the outstanding school side in Scotland, who won the Bell Lawrie Scottish Schools Cup (admission: £5 BAT's, FREE under 18's)

The BATs team will be made up from the wide North Edinburgh community and will be the best side we can get on the night from young people from Broughton High School, Trinity Academy, Drummond and Craigroyston Community High Schools, Fettes, Edinburgh Academy and from the regular BATs Under 18s. Both teams will include some young men who will represent Scotland at U18 or U17 level this season.

Where we are now

Since we started BATs in August 2005 we have made good progress thanks to the support of many - the local schools, businesses, a number of very valued partners (Active Schools, Telford College and The Scottish Rugby Union), and of course numerous volunteers.

We have over 150 young people as playing members and are running six teams S1, S2, U15, U16, U18 and a Development Team, which now plays in the Regional League Division 2 East. In addition, our Development Officer and three SVQ students have been carrying out development work during and after school at Broughton, Drummond and Craigroyston High Schools, 19 feeder Primary Schools and working with established rugby teams at Trinity Academy and Edinburgh Academy.

By the end of April we expect to have delivered around 500 sessions this season, with some 12,000 attendees at those sessions. I hope you agree that is a tremendous effort from Edinburgh BATs Rugby towards our aim to involve youth from all parts of the North Edinburgh community through our 'Club'
 
The Future

As far as the future goes we continue to approach various sources for funds to help run the Club. We have had support this year from Tods Murray, Baillie Gifford, Tiso, Sportsman’s Charity, The Scottish Rugby Union, Sportsmatch, some anonymous donations and of course our three partner clubs. We are working on putting together the resources needed to keep our Development Officer for another year and have had some success on that front recently.

We are already working on further developments and projects for later this year and next year – these include a league for the north Edinburgh developing High Schools, Summer touch/tag, a Friday Afternoon Club (to run all year) and employing a female SVQ to focus on developing girls rugby. It will be a challenging schedule whilst building and consolidating on what we have done over the last three years.

Please come and support us

Please put the date (16 April) in your diary - I do hope you can make it and if so look forward to seeing you at Raeburn Place on 16 April  - the bar opens at 5.30! –  and the kick off is at 6.30.

The futures good …….. with your support!

RUGBY FOR ALL – in the North Edinburgh Community