6.57am, Monday morning
Oxford is starting to wake up, a couple of cars and the occasional runner dotted about the roads. The sky is starting to lighten, but there’s no sign of the sun just yet. If you walked down to Iffley Road and peered round the corner of the Pavilion, you would see light quietly glowing from underneath the West Stand. If you walked down the gravel track and across the car park, you’d hear the beat of music and the rattling of barbells, and if you stepped inside you would find the Blues squad amidst their first gym session of the week. Second-year back-rower Henry ‘Hendo’ Henderson stands under a bending bar in front of the corner rack, braced for another heavy back squat, and the rest of the gym has paused to watch a massive 240 kilos move again. Sessions starting at 6.30am allow the group of busy students to train together around their schedules – but there’s another reason for such an early start beyond lessons and lectures. It means that the Blues must make a commitment to one another, to an early night and to getting up in the cold and the dark. It’ll count when the whistle goes.
6.02pm, Monday night
In the evening, it’s the Pavilion lights that are on. Chairs have been carried through from the dining room and are scattered around in front of the projector screen, and the tables are littered with an assortment of notebooks. There’s a hum of chatter as the squad catch up with each other after the day of Oxford life that has passed since they last trained. Players are still arriving from their colleges in ones and twos, filling the rows of furniture gathered ahead of the video review of last week’s game. Quiet falls when Head Coach Ian Kench connects his laptop and the Friday lights of the Iffley Road pitch appear on the screen, the Blues squad waiting on the breakdown of their latest performance – the messages to take into tonight’s training. Kench leads the review, but listening to the meeting you might hear the voice of any given player. You’d likely pick up the Australian accent of captain Jack Hamilton, or the experienced advice of ex-Saracens professional Josh Hallett – it’s a team of students, and the leaders within the squad will run the show just as much as their coaches.
7.34pm
OURFC’s first Men*s pitch session of the week is wrapping up, and the Iffley field is a busy scene. Fullback Harry Bridgewater is striking another ball from the tee, splitting the posts, whilst hooker Will Roddy practices throwing into a lineout; he aims for a catcher in the stands to mirror the height of a player being lifted in a lineout. Players from all three teams sit around in the stands, getting boots off and layers on with muddied hands. Monday night is always a tough session for an OURFC team, being the furthest out from weekend matches – it means time being tackled onto crash mats in ‘the Dojo’ and close-quarters contact at the Jackdaw Lane end. The ‘Dojo’ is an area hidden behind the West Stand, set aside for contact, and does plenty to live up to its name. Most of the training is done outside of the pitch itself, making sure that it stays pristine under the floodlights on game night. With the Varsity matches on the horizon, there’s a real sense of anticipation, an eye on the test ahead in every session now. Amongst the Blues, the weight of history cannot be ignored, and the field at Iffley is testament to that feeling. One field, shared by the whole club, is set against the backdrop of the Pavilion on the hill, which has stood since 1893.
7.15am, Wednesday morning
The University Parks are a pretty picture in the winter sunlight, with bare trees standing out against the morning sky and a layer of frost covering the fields. They’re mostly quiet, save for a few dog-walkers. At one end, however, the frost crunches under the feet of the OURFC Men*s section, out for their second field session of the week. With teams for the weekend taking shape, they can spend some time training as a unit, testing moves against one another and nailing down final details. This morning the ground is tough and slippery, so the boys need to move carefully – even the cold weather can’t throw off training.
At the end of the session, the group forms one huddle, mixing in players from the Blues, Greyhounds, and Whippets. The Wednesday session will move to the evening when the squad returns in January, so this is the final morning outing for the season – and for some, their final morning outing as part of the club. Today these players are the ones that will lead the ‘beat clap’ that marks the end of training – a quick routine of synchronised taps and claps to complete the players’ review of the session. Two taps on the knees, two on the chest, two claps: done. The huddle breaks, and the rest of the day can start.
6.49pm, Wednesday night
The Blues are well into their second gym session of the week, and have ventured outside the gym into the dark of Scrum Corner, opposite the hockey astro and under the scoreboard. Launching a medicine ball at a teammate backwards, over your head, and in the dark might look odd in any other context, but at Iffley Road it’s just part of the programme. There’s rugby on the pitch tonight too, a home BUCS fixture for the Women’*s Blues. They play every Wednesday, and when at home the Men’s side will number amongst their supporters in the stands. When 7.15pm rolls around, they will line the tunnel as their counterparts run out, clapping and encouraging to add to the noise that lifts any team in Dark Blue. This will be the last day of heavy training for the Blues before Friday night’s game, with the focus now moving to making sure that everyone is ready for game day.
6.05pm, Thursday evening
The Blues selected this week are back out on the pitch the night before the game, ready to walk through moves and bring absolute clarity onto the pitch tomorrow. There is a big emphasis on everyone knowing their role in every situation– no matter the time in the game or the area on the pitch. The theme this week has been to ‘get your house in order’; train and play knowing the job you have to do as an individual and work hard to get it right. At this stage, it would be easy for the mood to become quiet and serious, but the Team Run is perfect for taking the pressure off ahead of a game. Everyone wears an old jersey tonight, some from colleges, some international jerseys from previous years, many from clubs across the country that the Blues have represented at some point in their careers. Magdalen College captain Stu Brown is sporting the black and white stripes of his college as he boots a ball high into the sky, met by raucous cheers when it lands; Team Run also features light-hearted games between the forwards and the backs. They take the pressure away from the team on the eve of the game, but at the same time a score is very much kept – it’s a squad that loves to compete.
7.15pm, Friday night
Matchday. Iffley Road is packed with spectators, filling the stands and lining the pitch – this year has seen record attendance for the Blues. The prestige of Premiership opposition and ex-international Blues draws students and locals alike to nights like these. The pitch is ringed by food trucks and fans who turn out for the occasion, ready to come alive when those famous jerseys have taken the field. Tonight is the first game back at home for the Blues since before December, and a chance to show off how far the team has come. They return home following a historic tour of Australia where they tested themselves against professional side Brumbies, the Australian national 7s side, and Shute Shield opposition Sydney University. Their ranks are boosted by the addition of Reed Prinsep, adding all the power and experience of a decade in Super Rugby and ten international caps as a Māori All Black. 15 dark blue jerseys wait in the tunnel, ready to emerge into the noise and the light for 80 thrilling minutes.
If you walked down and peered around the corner of the pavilion on a Friday night like this one, it would be a very different picture to the faint glow of that Monday morning gym session. The atmosphere, the buzz of the crowd, the announcer on the microphone and the smell of food, all in anticipation of that moment when Jack Hamilton leads his team out. The work of this week and countless more like it comes together now, and adds today’s page to the long, illustrious history of the club.
The Varsity Matches take place on 28th February at the StoneX stadium.
