Our History

Greetings From The Near East

Derek Morgan

Though born, bred and mainly educated in Wales, his period spent qualifying as a dentist at Durham meant that the rugby ladder climbed by Derek Morgan was an English one. He reached the top of it however, with nine caps at number eight in the early 'sixties. And forty years on, became the President of the Rugby Football Union.

From England I would like to open this short contribution wih words of goodwill and encouragement to Welsh Academicals RFC: "Many congratulations on the past. Best wishes for the future.Your contribution has never been more important and, in the current rugby scenario, the need - in both countries - for clubs like the Accies has never been greater".

Next, perhaps I may be allowed to put on record my delight when I was first invited to play for the Accies. This continued to be the case whenever I subsequently received an invitation to turn out. The privilege of captaincy also came my way on a number of occasions, and prompts the following tale.

My first captaincy, I think, was in a match against Cardiff in the late 'sixties. Before the game Roy Bish, then the Cardiff coach, asked me to keep an eye on their new scrum half - about whom he would value my opinion after the game. Having known Roy for a number of years I immediately sensed that he thought there was something different about this player.

However, my afternoon was one of total concentration. Hence, when Roy asked me for my verdict my reply was "Oh, nothing special".

Sorry, Gareth.