The following report was penned by Andrew MacNeaney (LSRFUR President).
Dubai 7's has long been a staple of London's Exchange program and over the years, many of our members have enjoyed the fun and exhaustion (in equal measure) of this trip. However, over the last few years, through a combination of Covid and the changes at the tournament, London's presence has not been as strong, so I made the decision, in conjunction with the Head of MODC and Andrew Gayner, a veteran of over 15 Dubai trips, that as President, I should travel this year (2024) to re-establish our credentials as willing participants in whatever Dubai had to throw at us!
The format of the tournament, is arrival into Dubai on the Wednesday morning prior to the tournament weekend. That is a day of socialising with other officials, collecting kit and acclimatising to the Dubai heat. A group meal at the hotel that evening and some drinks in the hotel bar were a good way to break the ice with the massive number of nationalities who attend the tournament. This year over 70 referees from South Africa, England, Belgium, France, Germany, Malaysia, Spain, Gibraltar, Scotland, USA, Argentina and the UAE, to name just a few, were there to cover 3 days of dawn to dusk games. Also in attendance were 20 coaches (including myself) from all around the world who would review referees across the weekend so ensure the best referees were rewarded with finals on the Sunday.
Thursday is orientation day, a trip to the stadium on the outskirts of Dubai encompasses a presentation on 7's refereeing from some of the World Rugby referee cohort (this year, Herts George Selwood was our presenter), a stadium tour (there are 7 pitches in constant operation across the weekend) and various handouts. The evenings activity involved a group quiz back at the hotel (hosted by ex-London member Simon Dodd) before all participants were encouraged to get to bed reasonably early, because 3 long days were ahead of us!
The alarm shattered a deep sleep at 5.30am on Friday morning and 90 officials made their way to breakfast before the buses departed at 6.15am to bring us all to the stadium and the start of the tournament. With a 40-minute bus journey each way, 6.15am departures from the hotel on all 3 tournament days, and arrival back at the hotel around 11pm each night, Dubai will test your limits in every way imaginable and is not for the faint hearted! The first day's appointments had been circulated on Thursday evening, and at 8am exactly, our teams of 4 across 7 fields blew the starter guns on Dubai 2024. I mention the team of 4 because each official was placed into a pod of 4 people who would rotate through each role across 1hr 20minute blocks (Referee, AR1, AR2 and pitch manager) before earning a well-earned rest and then repeating it all over again until the last set of games kicked off at 9pm that evening. On the coaching side, our Head of MODC, Robbie, found himself as Coaching Co-Ordinator alongside Simon Dodd. I reviewed 10 referees' during that first day which consisted of watching their performance, reporting back a high-level assessment to Robbie and Simon via an app and then sitting down with the referee for a 5-10 minute debrief before repeating the process with another referee. As you can imagine, covering 7 pitches across a multi acre site meant the step count reach an impressive 20K+ on most days! The bus journey's back to the hotel were a time to take stock and enjoy a few songs before falling into bed (perhaps after 1 beer at the hotel bar) ahead of the 5.30am alarm clock as we repeated the entire process on Saturday and Sunday.
London's officials who represented the Society so well this year were:
Ben Stewart - rewarded with an AR1 role for the U19 final on Pitch 1 (the Grandstand pitch where the Professional Dubai 7's games are played throughout the weekend)
Yueli Ang - rewarded with two pitch 1 AR appointments and an International Social Plate Final as referee
Josh Methven - rewarded with an International Vets Plate Final as referee
Simon Waite - rewarded with a Gulf Men's Open Final as referee
The final games for our cohort wrapped up around 6pm on Sunday evening before everybody headed to the pitch 1 grandstand to watch the Invitational Men's Final (with London's Rich Gordon as AR1) and the professional Men and Women's semi-finals and finals games. A sing-song on the bus on the way back to the hotel and a few drinks at the bar was a fitting way to bring down the curtain on a great Dubai tournament for London's officials and to exchange contacts with the many new friends people had made over the weekend. Slowly people headed to bed, tired but with a great sense of accomplishment for making it through 3 gruelling days of games which will test your mental and physical fitness to the extreme. Flights departed throughout Monday back to London with our members, but they all performed extremely well on and off the field and London was recognised for buying-in into what Dubai is all about (on and off the field).
This report is just a taster of Dubai, but hopefully it enables you, our members, to understand that it is a testing trip. I would also like to clarify that there are a number of London members who attend on a regular basis who do not travel as part of London's official quota. Gloria (Andrew Gaynor) and Hannah are both direct invites from Dubai due to the off-field skills they bring while Rich was an RFU - Dubai selection made directly by the organisers. We were given 4 referee slots this year - Josh, Ben and Yueli in the development criteria, Simon was our London member from Panel (another selection criteria asked of us), while Robbie and myself represented the coaching spots for this year. While these things can change, we hope that this trip has secured our presence and the volume of opportunities for refereeing and coaching for future tournaments. Once this becomes clear over the coming months, Robbie, Alexis, Ken and Mark will initiate the selection process around summer time.
It is an excellent week of rugby and friendship and while I would love all our members to experience it. For those members who feel they could handle it, the selection process begins at the Rosslyn Park National School Sevens tournament in March - those rewarded with spots this year were recognised at last year's tournament and then followed up with commitments to Bournemouth and Summer Social, so please review your availability for those tournaments.