Congratulations to the ‘Joining Jack Veterans’ team following their recent win at the prestigious Emirates Dubai Rugby 7s tournament.
For the last six years, the Joining Jack charity has entered a team comprised of legends drawn from the very best of Rugby League and Rugby Union’s past players. The team has included the likes of dual code World Cup winner Jason Robinson, Rugby League legends Martin Offiah and Andy Farrell and this year added former Wigan Warriors player Pat Richards and England and Sale RU winger Mark Cuetto.
The team blasted through the early rounds winning 34, 59 and 64 to nil in each of the pool games before a tougher 21-17 quarter final win over the Mo Bro Vets. This was followed a comfortable 33-5 semi final win before a very tight 7-5 victory in the final over last year’s winners the J9 Legends. Having fallen just short in previous years, losing to J9 in last year’s semi and bearing in mind that the format is a big learning curve especially for the former RL players, winning is a great achievement.
Whilst lifting the trophy is sweet, the real reason for entering is to raise awareness and funds for the charity. Last year this topped £100,000 and they’re hoping for similar this year. This money is then used to fund research into finding a cure for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy and this is leading to some considerable success. In 2014, Joining Jack partnered with Duchenne UK and the Duchenne Research Fund to commit $5 million to help fund pre-clinical work for Solid Bioscience’s gene therapy programme which has now progressed to clinical trials. The funds raised are vital to support these programmes.
“There are a number of projects at the moment that are looking really promising and the money we raise from the tournament will go to research that is the most likely to result in a treatment reaching the patients as soon as possible. We couldn’t do this without the help of the players and our sponsors, they put a lot time and effort into helping us and we are so thankful to them all for their support.”
Comments Andy Johnson, former Wigan player, captain of the victorious Joining Jack Vets team, and Jack’s dad.
To find out more, please see www.joiningjack.org. bd2 has been a proud supporter of the charity since its inception and has developed the brand, supporting marketing strategies and provided their websites.