NEW signing Terence Babarinsa is looking forward to the next chapter in his career after moving to Rams RFC from Cinderford – and has hailed his first impressions of the club, writes Richard Ashton.
The dynamic back, who scored against his new side in both games last season, has moved into the area and has enjoyed training at Old Bath Road upon rugby’s return at the end of last month.
He revealed: “It’s been really enjoyable meeting the boys and working with the coaching staff and I’ve been made to feel really welcome.
“There’s a lovely atmosphere and everyone has come up to me, chatted to me, introduced themselves either with their real names or their nicknames, so it’s been really nice.”
He continued: “I understood eventually I’d have to move to Reading with work, and obviously the first club which came to mind was Rams – over my years with Cinderford they have always been one of our toughest opponents and the style of play was quite similar, so it seemed to be quite a good fit and it has been so far.”
A hugely popular figure in the Forest of Dean, Babarsina paid tribute to his former club, stating: “I had an amazing five years at Cinderford in terms of coming on as a young player.
“I’d been dropped from the Gloucester Academy set-up after a year, but I think my development was sterling in terms of what I was given by the club, the coaches and the supporters.”
And when asked what he hopes to bring to Old Bath Road, Babarsina concluded: “I really like to bring as much work rate as I can and I really pride myself on that.
“You can’t bring the fancy stuff without the hard work first, so I like to work on my defensive prowess and in attack, show the odd spin or two (out of a tackle).
“Hopefully I can bring something special to the club.”
Meanwhile stalwart back row Jamie Guttridge believes the squad are working harder than ever.
Last season’s Coaches’ Player of the Year is in his seventh campaign with Rams, having joined back in 2014, and was impressed when more than 40 of the group took part in an extra conditioning session after training recently.
He explained: “I used to use the optional sessions as a way to get ahead, but now everyone else is round you doing it as well, so you have to do even more outside of it to keep improving.
“But I think it’s one of the reasons we did so well in National One – everyone was putting the extras in and you need to do that to differentiate yourselves as a team.
“The new guys who’ve come in have fit in straight away – most of them have come up and introduced themselves or we’ve been introduced – and everyone just gets on. The family feel is as strong as ever.”
