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Zinzan does the honours.....
What a
brilliant night. Rugby Club members turned out in
large numbers to celebrate the opening of the Club’s
new training floodlights. The official switch on was
performed by New Zealand rugby legend Zinzan Brooke
and our very own Chairman of Mole Valley Council
Derek Burt who ceremoniously joined the two pieces
of fuse wire together that had been lovingly
prepared by Shane Edwards to trigger Dobbo’s one man
firework display and turning on the new lights.
“It was
a tremendous evening” commented Surrey President
John Vale. “When the RFU established funds to
 support
community rugby projects, Dorking was exactly the
sort of Club we had in mind. It was a pleasure to be
at the Big Field to see all the hard work come to
fruition”. Every section of the Rugby Club was
represented, the minis and Girls sections, the
seniors and the Derelicts as well as Rick Bruin from
the Rugby Football Union, David Kennington from the
National Trust, and Roger Hammond from the Brockham
Parish Council. The Brockham Badgers turned out in
force to support the event with the Badgers Chairman
Grant Ashley and Jason Rabbetts donating a signed
Barbarians shirt to be auctioned for the Big Field
Appeal.
Dorking
President Ted Ivens was equally pleased “Zinzan
Brooke was amazing. He spoke about the meagre
facilities he’d had playing rugby as a child in New
Zealand and how we should appreciate the fabulous
facilities at Dorking. He also joined the first
fifteen for their weekly team meeting. He was
fantastic with the kids and ended up attempting to
repeat his famous forty metre World Cup drop goal
under the new floodlights in his bare feet.”
Shaun
Grady added; ”Hats off to Juddy, John Aarvold, Pete
Terelak, Nick Presley and Mark Addicott for driving
the project and to Tony Murray for securing Zinzan
to do the honours. Apparently they used to play
together in their younger days and Tony was able to
get Zinzan along at short notice when Dean Richards
had to pull out. It turned out Zinny coaches the
under 7s at Windsor and ended up swapping tips and
hints with his counterpart at Dorking, Wolfie. He
certainly seemed to enjoy spending some time at the
Club. We are going to have to refer the bill for the
taxi waiting time to the Finance sub committee as
the All Black legend eventually headed out back to
Windsor in the wee small hours. Dobbo was discharged
from East Surrey on Friday morning, his burns are
not believed to be life threatening” |
