Bombers’ Obby carries flag for rugby

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This article was published 15/05/2010 (5718 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Obby Khan was a referee, hot dog server, tractor driver, photographer and coach of future Olympians on Thursday at Maple Grove Rugby Park.

Not a bad off-season day’s work for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers offensive lineman. As rugby Manitoba’s youth ambassador, Khan hosted his second annual Obby Khan Youth Rugby Jamboree with about 320 students from grades six-eight participating. It’s a fun day of flag rugby games with each student receiving a hot dog, chips and drink lunch, T-shirt and one-on-one attention from Khan, who races around between three fields meeting and helping the students.

The two-day event will continue on May 20 at MGRP when about 350 students are expected.

"Flag rugby is the perfect sport for kids and anyone can play. If you can run and throw the ball backwards, you’re a flag rugby player. It’s perfect," Khan said, noting players of all sizes and strengths can play and running shoes are the only equipment needed.

"Every kid out here will have touched the ball 30 or 40 times."

Khan noted the profile of flag rugby has been raised this year as an entry-level to the game of rugby sevens. Rugby sevens, with seven players on the field per side instead of 15, was accepted as an Olympic sport last fall by the International Olympic Committee and will make its debut in 2016 at the Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Rugby Canada wants to develop youngsters as it is considering the target age group for the 2016 Olympians to be those athletes who will be aged 16-25 that year.

"Just walking around here, I can spot a good 50 kids that have the potential to really excel at this sport and I could seem them progressing to the provincial level and onward," Khan said.

"This program is important to me because I think any sport is great for kids, all aspects of it — leadership, communication, hard work, respect — and it keeps them busy in a positive activity. I was a bit of a trouble-maker until I started playing football and rugby. I straightened out because I had something to work towards."

In February Kahn started visiting approximately 30 schools, where he provided an introduction to the game, instruction and a presentation about the importance of working hard in school.

Sydney Smith, a grade eight River Heights student, said she’ll attend Kelvin High School next year where she will join the school rugby team and put her new skills to work.

"I hadn’t really heard about rugby before this but now I want to keep playing. It includes running and passing and those are two things I really like doing in sports," said Smith, 13, attending her second jamboree. "Having Obby here really makes it fun because he’s such a good role model, he knows lots of rules and he knows how to talk to you, more like person-to-person than adult-to-child."

Zack Strike, 13, is in his first season of flag rugby.

"I like how it’s really fast-paced and there’s almost no breaks," said Strike, a grade eight St. John’s Ravenscourt student. "It’s a safe way to teach the fundamentals of the game to kids who want to play rugby. Now, with something like that (the Olympics), more kids might get involved because that’s huge and something that could actually pay off."

Megan Luff and Samantha Line, both grade eight students at Bruce Middle School, were members of two of five teams at the Jamboree from their school.

"Seeing Obby out here makes you want to go on in rugby because you see how good he is at what he does and you think, ‘that could be us if we work hard enough,’" said Luff.

July 9 at the Winnipeg Blue Bombers game, Khan’s flag rugby program will be the halftime show. The winners of the May 13 and 20 jamborees earn spots in that game. Four other teams will be compiled using at least three players from each school in the program.

ashley.prest@freepress.mb.ca

What is flag rugby?

— seven-a-side

— non-contact, co-ed

— games are played on half a field

— a try (ball run into end zone) is one point if a boy scores, two points if a girl scores

— when the ball-carrier’s flag is captured, the ball-carrier has three steps to pass it off

— no kicks allowed, no diving for a loose ball, to capture a flag or to score