Schoolboy trio’s brush with fame at England-Italy Twickenham clash

Jake Nardone from Ormiston Six Villages Academy, Taylor Clarke of Felpham Community College and Ollie Luxton from The Regis School will be appearing on the pitch before kick-off at the RBS 6 Nations England v Italy match.

They have been chosen to represent their schools at Twickenham as part of the All Schools programme, an England Rugby initiative to get more state secondary schools playing rugby. They will be wearing rugby shirts designed by pupils from their schools at a Canterbury kit design workshop held last year.

Canterbury are official kit suppliers to England and have been partners to the All Schools programme since it began three years ago.

Each year 100 state secondary schools are invited to take part in the programme during which they are given an opportunity to attend one of a number of workshops with designers.

The local trio attended a workshop at Milbrook RFC where the pupils enjoyed an interactive session on the history of the rugby shirt and the practicalities of design before being given free rein to create a shirt in which their school rugby team will play.

At the end of the workshop the final design was signed off by the school and handed over to Canterbury for production.

Canterbury has produced a set of team shirts for each of the 100 schools involved and the final results will be seen at Twickenham on Saturday, when Jake, Taylor and Ollie will join 97 other pupils on the pitch each wearing their school’s design.