Are you an overseas player thinking of having your gap year or a break playing rugby in England? There is no better place than Norwich , a friendly city set in the heart of the British countryside on the East Coast within easy connection of London Stansted airport  and daily direct rail links with London Liverpool Street station. 

Norwich is the city of the County of Norfolk  which is the 5^th largest of the 48 counties of England but with one of the lowest densities of population by area. It has the lowest crime rate in the UK and is a very rural county with lots of wide open spaces. Norwich is the largest conurbation with less than 400,000 people. Norwich RFC is on the edge of the world famous Norfolk Broads, a tranquil haven for fishing and sailing. The county also boasts unique landscapes from the vast skies of the farmlands in the west of the county, bordering Cambridgeshire, to the rolling splendour of North Norfolk with its spectacular coastal fishing villages. Lord Nelson was born here and the Queen owns the magnificent Sandringham Estate where the Royal Family traditionally spend the new year. 

Ok, so much for the area, it’s a great place to live or visit. What about the rugby? Norwich RFC are keen to encourage any overseas player that would like to come and join the party. We run four adult teams so you don’t need to be a star player to be made welcome here and we encourage senior players to try their hand at coaching too if that is of interest.

Norwich 1^st XV currently play in London 3 North East division. The team is a friendly outgoing bunch of lads that train hard and play fully committed rugby but know how to enjoy themselves too. The spirit in the senior squads is outstanding and makes being part of it a joy. The selection policy is open and merit based , so if you are good enough and work hard enough you can certainly aspire to play for the 1^st XV.

What can we offer you? 

First and foremost we offer enjoyable, hard, physical rugby, both at our twice weekly training sessions and on Saturday’s representing Norwich in one of our 4 senior teams.

Of course to play rugby you have to sustain yourself and while Norwich RFC is an amateur club, there are strict guidelines enforced by the English RFU regarding amateur players status that we fully enforce, we have an extensive and established local network of members that can help connect new players to local employment opportunities and convenient accommodation. As one of England's oldest clubs, celebrating our 125^th anniversary last season, not many clubs have such an extensive local network of members, so talk to us and we’ll see if we can help with a connection to find work that you are suited or qualified for. We have recently welcomed a number of players to the club from Poland, New Zealand and Greece and regularly welcome players moving to the area to attend the renowned  University of East Anglia located on the edge of Norwich.

Further, we are always interested in forging regular exchange programmes giving  younger players the opportunity to experience rugby in other cultures and lands with players from our Club travelling in the other direction in the future with your club back home, why not give us a call, we’d love to hear from you.