2Degrees award $50,000 to school girls’ rugby

2degrees have been running a nationwide campaign called “Path2Greatness” offering $50,000 (10x $5,000) to secondary schools girls rugby teams.

Over the past few months, 2degrees received over 250 fantastic nominations and have selected ten winning schools to take home a prize of $5,000 to invest in their women’s rugby programme.

The ten winners are spread all throughout the country, from Southland to the Bay of Islands, and three of them come from our own Matatū region.

We’d like to congratulate Nayland College, Southland Girls High School and Geraldine High School as the three winners from the Matatū region

Sarah Munro, General Manager of Matatū, the Super Rugby Aupiki team representing the South Island, was thrilled to see investment going back into the female grassroots game,

“All support of girls and women’s rugby helps develop and grow the game, and five thousand dollars will go a long way at each school. It wonderful to see the spread of funding across New Zealand and I’m so pleased that three schools within the Matatū catchment will benefit.  If rugby at school level is strong, then that bodes well for the further of the Super Rugby Aupiki competition”  

Geraldine High School has a strong connection to Matatū, with former pupil Amanda Murphy the teams current Head of Strength & Conditioning. Murphy commented that resources are so critical to the improvement of the game at any level.

“As someone who works directly with high performance players, I know that every bit of money and resource that goes into a system, if managed correctly will result in improvements and positive outcomes.  I’m so pleased for the girls programme at my old school, and I know they will really use this funding to benefit as many players and coaches as possible”

The Crusaders and Matatū want to acknowledge the contribution 2degrees have made for the betterment of women’s rugby in New Zealand and are excited to see what happens next in this space.