Warrington Referees Society recently welcomed guests from South African Rugby League during their visit to the country.

Rudolph du Plooy and Frans van der Merwe visited Warrington’s May society meeting and give a fascinating insight into refereeing and Rugby League in South Africa.

They spoke about the challenges, opportunities and success of the rapidly growing sport in the country and answered a variety of intriguing questions from the Warrington Referees. Both Frans and Rudolph are visiting the UK as part of a two week fact finding mission to help improve the referees and the structures in South Africa which included the trip to visit local community referees and a Match Officials training weekend in London.

Frans van der Merwe South African RL Referees chairman said: “We’d like to thank the Warrington Referees Society for allowing us to visit them and experience how the development of community referees happens at local level.

We hope during the two weeks we are in the UK that we can take away as much information to aid our own development and visiting Warrington has provided us with some great ideas to take back. They are a fantastic group of people and I hope to see them progress to top matches in the future”

Peter Brooke North West Match Officials Development officer said “This was a great opportunity for local referees to hear firsthand how the development of referees works in another country.

“The talk both Frans and Rudolph gave will give the officials a great insight to see we are not too different and the message remains the same, work hard and the rewards will come.”

Any official wishing to take up the challenge and become a referee can attend the next course in the North West on Saturday 18th June at Golborne Parkside, for further information contact Peter Brooke on peter.brooke@rfl.uk.com