This Tuesday
Jersey's first team captain, Alex Rae travelled to London for the
launch of the 2013/14 Green King IPA Championship.
There he met with the eleven other captains
from the second tier of professional rugby as well as former
England and Scotland Head Coach Andy Robinson, who took the reins
at promotion favourites Bristol last spring, in a Greene King pub
in St Margaret's, Twickenham.
The launch celebrates the start of the new
season which is planned to be Jersey's most exciting to date and
kicks off on the weekend of September 14/15 with Greene King IPA's
Big Rugby Weekend.
The weekend will include three double
header matches including Jersey v Plymouth Albion which will be
shown live on Sky Sports in the Islanders' debut outing on
Sky.
On his return to the Island and before his
trip to France for a pre-season training camp Rae said: "It's great
to get together ahead of a new season and meet your future
opponents. All captains seemed really confident and certainly each
squad and club are improving year on year.
"It's great to have a sponsor on board this
year as I think they have been looking for one for some years and
hopefully Greene King will help promote the quality of the
Championship.
"The increased Sky coverage should also
help and all the boys are looking forward to the first outing in
the double header against Plymouth at Sandy Park later this month.
It's a cliché but we really are taking each game as it comes and
our focus remains solely on Plymouth who have also
strengthened.
"We respect each opponent in this league
and although we aren't going to be shouting about promotion plans
this season, we don't want to be in a relegation battle again and
our aim is to give our fans something to cheer about."
