London Irish

London Irish
Full name	London Irish Rugby ; Football Club
Nickname (s)	The Exiles
Founded	1898
Stadion	Madejski Stadium
Places	24,250
president	Brian Facer
Trainer	Declan Kidney
Homepage	london-irish.com
league	Aviva Premiership
2018/19	Championship champion, promoted
home	Away

London Irish (officially London Irish Rugby Football Club , often also called The Exiles ) is an English rugby union club that plays in the English Premiership . The first team does not play their home games in London, but in Reading at the Madejski Stadium . The mascot is Digger , an Irish Wolfhound .

history

The London Irish Rugby Football Club was founded in 1898 to give young Irish people living in London the opportunity to play rugby. The example of the London Welsh RFC (for Welsh) and the London Scottish FC (for Scots) were followed. The club was hit hard by the effects of the First World War and the Irish War of Independence and was only able to sign players from Ireland again from 1923 (after the establishment of the Irish Free State ). The first national player from the club's ranks was SJ Cagney in the second half of the 1920s.

In December 1931, the club's own stadium, The Avenue, was inaugurated in Sunbury-on-Thames, southwest of London. Over the years, London Irish has shown average performances. For the 1976/77 season, the Rugby Football Union, after long hesitation, introduced scoring tables and London Irish won the London Division. In 1990 the first team rose to the top division. London Irish struggled with financial difficulties in the increasingly professional league, which also had an impact on performance on the field: In 1994 London Irish relegated to National Division One , but in 1996 they were promoted again.

In 1999 London Irish merged with London Scottish and Richmond FC and has since formed the umbrella organization for the two other clubs. In addition, a new amateur team was formed, the London Irish Amateur RFC. Since 2001, the first team has played at the Madejski Stadium in Reading due to capacity reasons, but The Avenue remains the “spiritual home” and home of the youth and amateur teams. The London Irish achieved the greatest success in the club's history in 2002 when they won the Powergen Cup . In 2009 they reached the final in the English championship, but failed there because of the Leicester Tigers .