Nigel Melville Direct

Last night I flew to New York to attend the Rugby Legends dinner at the Union Square Ballroom, a venue befiting the occasion, a dinner with the opportunity to meet some rugby legends and raise a significant amount of money for charity, one of the charities involved being Play Rugby USA.

Visiting legends attending were, Keith Wood (Ireland), Jonathan Davies (Wales), Jeremy Guscott (England), Ieuan Evans (Wales) and John Taylor (Wales).

The dinner was attended by the great and the good from the New York Rugby community along with a number of sponsors and hopefully potential sponsors of rugby. Sponsored by HSBC and British Airways, the event was extremely successful raising more than $70,000 for charities and providing a fantastic networking opportunity.

Highlight of the evening (apart from my opening welcome, of course) was the Legends question and answer session, where players responded to questions from the audience. Asked to recount their most memorable games, you got the usual try saving, try-scoring machismo, until it came to Ieuan Evans who recounted the first time he played against Jonah Lomu. His strategy worked for the first 25 minutes of the game, he avoided going anywhere near him!

Today, a little worse for wear, I have spent the day in meetings with a wide range of people including discussions on Web site design, women’s rugby, rugby camps, fundraising opportunities, college rugby and the monthly Churchill Cup Executive conference call. A quick retreat to LaGuardia to catch the last plane to Denver – delayed because of snow in Denver!

Tomorrow marks the start of this year’s Youth Conference on the Game. I am looking forward to working with our youth community this weekend; there have been a number of developments since we announced the launch of Rookie Rugby, and we have a massive opportunity before us…

If I get home!