New Rygbi Gogledd Cymru (RGC) Director Of Rugby, Josh Leach has stepped up from his role as being Performance Manager for the upcoming Super Rygbi Cymru league which gets underway this weekend when the Gogs play Cardiff RFC at Stadiwm CSM.
Having played for RGC on 108 occasions from Division 1 East upwards he was apart of the RGC coaching set up that won promotion from the Championship in 2016 to the Premiership, Leach states his excitement ahead of the 2024/25 season.
“It’s exciting to be apart of the new competition, shifting from what was the old Premiership into the new league and hopefully the new competition adds a bit more of competition for our young players coming through,” said Leach.
“It’s a platform for our young players coming through the pathway and it will help them to push onto the professional game.
“For ourselves in North Wales it’s really important as we don’t have a professional team that sits above us or based in North Wales we tend to work with all four regions.
“Obviously having a platform that supports our academy players and giving them the best opportunity to play at the highest level and for them to push onto the professional game is really important for us,” he added.
The Gogs began preparation for the upcoming season with three pre-season games. They first played Merseyside’s Caldy RFC and lost 26-24 before back-to-back wins against Bethesda RFC (57-10) and Swansea University (59-7).
“We’ve talked about turning things around and the players have really put a huge amount of effort into doing that, in the way they have worked together,” said Leach on pre-season.
“The most pleasing thing is probably the way the boys have come together the last couple of years and last year in particular was a little bit disappointing for us but we look forward to this season.
“We’ve signed a couple of boys, some of whom have been with us before, Danny Cross (Kowloon), Billy McBryde (Doncaster Knights) and then a few new faces like Connor Dever (Rotherham), Dan Roderick (Swansea University) and Gruff John Morris.
“They are boys who haven’t been a part of our pathway previously but they will certainly add something to the environment. They probably add a few more bits of experience to the team, where we probably lacked a little last year, which was a little bit in leadership.
“The good thing about last year a lot of the younger players got a good amount of game time and that certainly puts them in a better position to have an impact this year.
“One of our ambitions is to start performing as a team that the region can be proud of, we’ll know that it won’t happen overnight but that’ll build over the year as we work our way up the table really to be competitive at the top,” added Leach.
A lot of the main aims of the new league is to provide young players with more playing opportunities at a higher level on a more frequent basis.
“We’ve worked really hard over the last year to have a really good relationships with the regions,” said Leach on development of players.
“We’ve got Efan Jones who’s down at the Scarlets having come through and played for RGC through our pathway over the years and you’ve got the likes of Dylan Alford who’s just come out of the U18’s and he’s on a dual contract with us and the Scarlets, so we’ve been working closely with them on his development.
“And as a club we will be looking at doing the same scenarios with the best players in North Wales in the next year or two.
Unlike the other nine teams, the Gogs begin their season with three home games on the bounce. They begin by facing Cardiff RFC, then they face the double Champions Llandovery RFC before playing Pontypool RFC a week later. With the travel not being a worry until game week four for RGC, it is demanding compared to other sides as they have to travel between 3-6 hours every other week to play away matches.
“It’s demanding but to be fair to the players it’s a hell of a commitment,” said Leach on the travelling.
“It’s a commitment for them and also sometimes this has an impact on players we are able to recruit because of the time commitment involved.
“If the boys want to play at a certain level they’ve got to be prepared to make the sacrifice to do so and to be fair to them they don’t whinge about it and we try to make it as enjoyable as we can taking into consideration with the training and stuff,” he added.
The Gogs welcome The Blue and Blacks on Saturday to Stadiwm CSM for the opening fixture, on that Leach said: “ It’s very exciting, Cardiff the last few years have been a really tough team and then we have got Llandovery up second so from the first couple of games we will have a real good feel for where we are at, how much progress we’ve made over the summer and how we’ll have to go as the season goes on.
“Of course it’s important to be strong at home, there’s a little bit of an advantage sometimes when some teams have been sitting on a bus for five or six hours whether they’ve come up the night before or the morning of.
“We have got a really good support base, they turn out and make a fair bit of noise and you always want to win at home. We’ll be keen to make that the case and make sure we perform well when we are at home and make it a difficult place for teams to come,” Leach concluded.
Words By Harry Tovey
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