If you’re new to this sport, or wondering what we’re all about, here’s a little history of rugby:
The full name rugby football is a sport originating in Rugby, England. It’s been been played since 1823, and has grown worldwide ever since, played in many countries across the globe. Many american universities played versions of rugby prior to the split of the sport into american football in the 1860-1900 era until the foundation of rule-sets with the NCAA in the early 20th century.

Many terms from rugby are still used in american football, such as Quarterback, Touchdown, and Field Goal. It’s a sport that combines fitness, physicaliy, and quick on your feet decision making. It’s one of the best truly team sports that we know of.

Basics of the game are a 15 on 15 competition on a ‘soccer’-ish sized pitch where players may only pass the ball backwards to teammates, and may not interfere in play while ahead of the ball. Players must release the ball after being tackled, where a ruck is typically formed until the ball is ‘hiked’ out the back of the ruck to start a new ‘down’. A team them has unlimited ‘downs’ to either score, or kick for position, or accidentally turn over the ball. It is a continuous, fluid game that is only temporarily stopped by a referee when an infraction has taken place. Scoring is similar to american football where a player can score a ‘touchdown’ or ‘try’ for 5 points (with a 2 point ‘PAT’ or ‘conversion’), and ‘field goals’ or ‘goals’ for 3 points. (Other rare scoring can happen with a dropgoal… see the link below)

Rugby has also gained popularity with a ‘spinoff’ sport of Rugby 7’s, where team plays with 99% of typical rugby rules on the same size pitch but with only 7 players on each team. This is a much quicker and speedier game, and has event been admitted to the Olympics.

Check out this Wiki Page for more info: Wikipedia
Check out some great scoring in the recent World Cup: Great Tries at RWC 2023
A Beginner’s Guide to Laws (rules) of the Game: Rugby Basics
Check out this fun remnant of Rugby Football in American Football: Flutie Dropgoal!

The U19 15’s program will be starting indoor training at the NH Sportsdome training facility in Goffstown, New Hampshire, and will train from mid February til mid April, and then move outdoors for matches typically running from late April til early June

The U15 15’s middle school program will be running in the spring (details to come)

In the summer months, we typically continue with a U19 7’s program from June through August.

You can find locations related to our teams on our Info tab and link to all maps for all training and match locations

Yes, we happily welcome boys and girls at all ages to our teams. In the past we have had separate womens’ teams and/or combined with other local teams for womens events. Some of our women players have gone on to represent our country in international rugby events! We have mixed training sessions that respect safety as required.

Read all the information on our Info/Events tab for details. Then, click the Registration button at the top of the page, or click HERE, to take you to the registration pages. Just fill out the forms at that website and go from there!

Registration fees provide training jerseys and shorts for training and match play. All we ask is that you provide a molded mouth guard and proper cleats/boots. The indoor facilities are artificial turf and outdoor matches will be played on artificial turf and natural grass.

All of our coaches at Amoskeag are USA Rugby Coaching certified, which includes safety training. We are SafeSport certified. We teach this sport to newcomers in a safe and controlled environment. That being said, rugby is still a very physical contact sport that will utilize much of a player’s body and fitness.

Send us an email at amoskeagyouthrugby@gmail.com and we’ll get back to you at quickly as we can.