The Malta Rugby Football Union (MRFU) is committed towards promoting and improving the standards of women’s rugby in Malta.

Rugby is one of the fastest growing sports on our islands and, in recent years, more and more women are joining in.

“The earlier we can get women involved with rugby the better,” Stefan De Marco, Falcons coach for girls rugby, said in an MRFU statement this week.

“Myself, as an ex-league player, and Peter Bradley, a former national team player, thought that it would be a great idea to start coaching rugby to girls and back in 2010 we started classes at the school in Ħamrun.

“The response we received was very encouraging and the number of girls now willing to continue practising rugby continues to grow significantly.”

This on-going effort to raise the profile of rugby across the board has the vital backing of GasanMamo Insurance.

“Seeing the way rugby has evolved in Malta makes us very proud,” Mark Mamo, general manager at GasanMamo Insurance, said.

“At GasanMamo, we support such unique and important initiatives and we see the introduction of girls in rugby as an important progression in order to keep moving the sport forward.”

Girls Youth Rugby was launched in 2010 when the Maltese rugby organisation contracted foreigners as community coaches to aid some local clubs in organising youth nurseries.

The coaches used to visit schools in different localities and also held after-school sessions, instilling a huge interest among young hopefuls in the sport.

Today, various girl schools are registered to play in the KMS inter schools tournament.

By way of enhancing the fun aspect of the sport, some of the teams involved also succeed in winning a few games when competing with boys schools at Tag Rugby level.

The girls compete in the various mixed MRFU Tag tournaments and at the International Tag Festival where foreign teams visit the islands each year to promote the sport.

Further information about girls rugby may be obtained by phoning the MRFU on 21-221492.