It’s a big day for our Scottish fly half, Jamie Annand, as he starts against his former side, Nottingham. The Archers have had a good start to the season – Jamie is settling in nicely at Ellgia Fields after making the switch in the summer, having also successfully skippered Nottingham University in the BUCS rugby competition.
Jamie arrived here after time at Wasps Academy and three years in Nottingham, having left his home in Dubai at the age of 17 for a shot at a career in the game he loves:
“I tried to take the opportunity at Wasps with both hands. There’s a lot of talent over here – which was a shock to the system as Dubai is a bit of a small ‘bubble’ – I got the opportunity to go to Nottingham University via the Wasps programme and it worked out well for me as a number of my team mates were left without a club, without rugby, wi their a job, with Wasps’ demise. It was very lucky as it turned out – I could’ve been signed to a full-time contract – so Nottingham became my constant, I absolutely loved being there, it’s a great place. And I successfully combined BUCS with Champ Rugby at Lady Bay. I’ve learned so much coming to this country and it’s given me a lot back!
“I’ve got a lot of time for the lads I played with at the Archers – I had a great time there. I’m really looking forward to going into battle with them this weekend and catching up afterwards. When Cambridge came to Lady Bay on Easter Sunday the lads knew by then that I was joining. I had a decent game on as a replacement which I was pleased with. As soon as last season was over though, it was ‘all eyes’ on the project that Newbs was building here and focussing fully on that. Whilst we may not have had the start we hoped for, it’s been slightly slower, we’re putting in so much effort on the training pitch and on match days to make things happen the way we want them to and to show the fans what we’re about and give them something to celebrate. The lads are ‘bought in’ to the project and we’ve got a lot of fire in our bellies, looking to turn this around and start taking more points and winning matches.
“Nottingham have always been an expansive team – they have a strong set piece. They’ll be pragmatic and also look to throw the ball around. We’ll look to counter that and put our mark on the game first. I missed last week at Caldy though injury but the lads’ performance was tremendous. There were some really good take-aways from that, some real positives. We’ve been applying those learnings in training, we appreciate that the fans come here to Ellgia Fieldss every other week, expecting a performance and a result and that’s what we’re going to try and deliver. Once things click properly, and we know that they will, things will turn around very quickly”.