THE RUGBY CLUB

Rugby has been played for more than two centuries.

In America, the Game has roots stretching back more than 150 years. But almost from the beginning, rugby created something beyond the teams that took the field.

It created clubs.

Across generations and continents, the rugby club became an institution of its own. Players and former players. Families and supporters. Coaches and volunteers. Young players growing up around the Game. Social members and friends who belonged to the Club whether they ever pulled on a jersey or not.

Teams represented the Club.

They were never the entirety of it.

Exiles Rugby Club is carrying that tradition into the 21st century.

We are not building a collection of rugby teams that happen to share a name. We are building one Club, with men's, women's and youth rugby at its sporting heart and a wider membership gathered around it.

Players. Families. Former players. Coaches. Volunteers. Supporters. Social members. Friends of the Club.

Different generations. Different relationships with the Game.

One Club. One crest.

Rugby clubs have always developed traditions of their own.

The club tie. The blazer crest. Touring sides, and visiting sides and clubs. Match dinners. Presentation nights. Club photographs. Honors boards. Stories handed from one generation to another.

We intend to preserve the best of those traditions.

Not as costume. Not as pretension. And never as a barrier to belonging.

Traditions give a Club continuity. They connect the newest member with those who came before and those who will follow.

The crest means something because generations have worn it with pride.

The great rugby clubs are more than sporting organizations. Over generations, they become institutions within the communities they represent.

They develop a character of their own. A recognizable crest. Traditions worth preserving. Members who take pride in belonging. Families who remain connected for generations. Businesses, supporters and community leaders who become part of the Club's story.

That is what we are building in North Fulton.

A Club with ambition on the field and substance beyond it. A Club that welcomes people into rugby rather than placing barriers around it, while still believing that membership, tradition and representing the crest should mean something.

Something worth joining. Something worth supporting. Something worth preserving.