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Billy Williams’ Cabbage Patch
The
English Rugby Football Union’s ground at Twickenham, the headquarters of the game, also known as Twickers. It is popularly
so called after William (Billy) Williams (1860–1951), who discovered the site and who persisted until it was acquired
for rugby in 1907. The latter part of the name refers to the ground’s former use as a market garden. The first match
played there, on 2 October 1909, was between Harlequins and Richmond, and the first international was England v. Wales the
following year. The nearby Railway Tavern changed its name to the Cabbage Patch in 1959 when England and Wales played Scotland
and Ireland in a centenary match. The ground is now also the site of the World Rugby Museum, and tours of the stadium are
held six days a week, except when a match or event is taking place.
Billy Williams’s cabbage patch has
never staged a more momentous game than this afternoon’s match between England and the All Blacks.
The Times
(9 October 1999)
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| The cabbage patch today |
London Scottish FC
A rugby union
club originally founded in 1878 by a group of London-based Scots exiles. Based in Richmond, the club enjoyed a distinguished
history in rugby union’s amateur period up until 1995, contributing numerous players to the Scottish national side.
London Scottish failed to survive as a professional club, however, and was disbanded in 1999 (when it was nominally merged
with London Irish). A resuscitated amateur club has since worked its way up several divisions from the bottom of the league
pyramid and assumed semi-professional status.
The Stoop
The informal name of
the Twickenham Stoop, formerly the Stoop Memorial Ground, which is situated on Langhorn Drive in north-west Twickenham. The
Harlequin (rugby union) Football Club acquired the pitch for training purposes in 1963, subsequently playing its home matches
here. Since 2005 Harlequins’ sister rugby league club has shared the ground, which is named after Adrian Dura Stoop
(1883–1957), a London-born rugby union player of Dutch descent. Stoop played 182 times for Harlequins, serving as team
captain for eight years and later becoming the club’s honorary secretary and then president. Quite separately, ‘the
stoop’ was formerly a slang term for the pillory.
Wasps
The short name of London
Wasps and Wasps FC, both of which are rugby union clubs. Their mutual antecedent was formed in 1867 as a breakaway from Hampstead
FC and played its early games at a ground on Finchley Road. Wasps aspired to be founder members of the Rugby Football Union
but failed to attend that body’s inaugural meeting in January 1871. As the club’s historian explains: ‘In
true rugby fashion the team turned up at the wrong pub, on the wrong day, at the wrong time.’ Wasps rented several grounds
around London before settling at sudbury in 1923. The club split into professional and amateur halves in 1996, the former
subsequently adding ‘London’ to its name, although its home games are now played outside the capital at Adams
Park in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire. The club has contributed many players to the England national side, including Roger
Uttley, Nigel Melville, Rob Andrew and Lawrence Dallaglio. Wasps FC plays at Twyford Avenue sports ground in Acton, where
the professional club trains and has its offices.
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