Page 12 - Sports Energy News, Cornwall, Issue No 81

12 Issue #81 August 2019 www.sportsenergynews.com

‘Old Boys’: Rugby in Cornwall

By Casey Leger

ugby has a long and proud tradition in
RCornwall. It’s been a high school sport. It’s
been a club sport. It’s been played by boys, girls,
men, and women. With no official club playing
in the city, it has now become the old boys’ job to
keep rugby alive in Cornwall.
“Old boys is a version of the game for people
over the age of thirty-five who still want to play,”
says Raj Gill, the president of the Cornwall
Crusaders Rugby Club. “It’s full contact, just
like the kids play. The players range from thirty-
five to over seventy, and the games are usually an
hour instead of eighty minutes. Otherwise, it’s the
same.”
Gill was born in North York and grew up in
Georgian Bay. Now forty-four, he started playing
rugby in 1991 when he was in grade ten. He played
varsity rugby at Carleton University. He was a
long-time member of the Ottawa Indians and then
the Ottawa Ospreys Rugby Club, and when he
The Barrhaven, Kingston, and Cornwall Old Boys finish the season in the snow. Photo Submitted
moved to Cornwall, he got involved in the rugby
community there.
Ottawa, Kingston, Lanark, Syracuse, Connecticut, Anyone who is interested in getting involved
“We have about eight guys from the area who Brockville, Barrhaven… The rugby community in full-contact rugby, old boys or otherwise,
play old boys,” says Gil. That’s not enough to is very welcoming. It’s easy to get over twenty should email Gill at rajgill27@gmail.com. “No
field a local side, he explains, so the Cornwall old games in a season if you count tournaments,” he experience necessary,” he says. “We’ll teach you
boys travel together to play for clubs that want to says. “We’ll have a side in the Highland Games, the game.”
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fill their rosters. “We’ve played for teams from too.”

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