The Old Glory Rugby team is making Germantown its new home, bringing professional rugby to the community, settling into its new home at the Maryland SoccerPlex.
Old Glory is a part of the US Rugby Men’s Major League. In the League, there are two conferences. The Eastern Conference has 6 teams and the Western Conference has 5 teams. Each of the 11 teams are located in a different state. Old Glory is entering into their sixth season in the US rugby league, which has been running since 2011.
The soccerplex reached out to Old Glory when the Washington Spirit moved from the Maryland SoccerPlex to Audi Field in Washington, DC, in 2023. But they ended up being a month too late, as Old Glory had already decided to move to SegraField in Leesburg. After a few seasons, the team was looking for a new venue, specifically with a grass field, so they reached out to the SoccerPlex.
Executive Director of the Soccer Plex, Matt Libber, stated. “The biggest advantage is our natural grass field. We constantly receive high praise from other teams about how good our field is.”
Before Old Glory came to the SoccerPlex, they added six sets of international standard goal posts to their inventory and added rugby field dimensions to their robot painters. Old Glory moved to the Maryland SoccerPlex in their 2024 season under a one-year license agreement.
“I believe the team’s long-term goal is to have a stadium of their own in D.C.. However, with the current budget situation in D.C., that will probably be several years away.” Libber said. “We continue to make small improvements to the facility every year. Right now, no major renovations are planned, but that could change at any point, as we are currently looking to add another tenant team to the SoccerPlex.”
Chris Dunlavey, Old Glory Chairman and team owner, described why the team decided to move to Germantown.
“Previously, Old Glory DC has played in Washington DC (at Catholic University) and in Leesburg, VA (at Segra Field).” Dunlavey said. “But both of our owners, Paul Sheehy and myself, grew up in Montgomery County and have always considered it home, and the project management company I run played a hand in the original development of the Maryland SoccerPlex. So we knew the facilities here well, and we knew the market in Germantown well, so we knew this would be a great place to bring our team.”
The soccerplex draws a few thousand fans per game. Having the availability to seat 3,200 fans.
“The SoccerPlex stadium is a great venue.” Dunlavey said.“It’s one of those venues that is designed like a sunken bowl – the field is below the concourse – the walkway where you enter and walk along to reach your seats – and that means that everybody in every seat or even along the concourse can all see each other and everything happening on the field throughout the whole game, which creates a real sense of community, because everybody is having the same experience all together at once. That translates to a great atmosphere, where the fans are heavily engaged in the game and everything going on in the crowd, and the players really feed off of the engagement and the fan support!”
Executive Director of the Soccer Plex Matt Libber said, “We have gotten a lot more inquiries from youth teams for space for rugby games and practices here. It also introduced county residents to a sport they may know nothing about. You will see soccer families stop and watch through the stadium fence before and after their games to see what this ‘rugby thing’ is all about.” Libber
The season started Feb 15, and as of the beginning of April, Old Glory is in the middle of its season with 6 games played and 12 games left.
Old Glory practices three times a day with one off day and a match on the weekend.
Head Coach Simon Cross stressed that ” it’s important that training reflects games, so coaches need to produce training sessions that replicate the feel and tempo of an actual match. Players will tend to train three times a day, completing a weights session with the Head of Strength and Conditioning, a Units session with their respective coaches, and a full team session in the afternoon.”
Old Glory also has a program called Young Glory. Young Glory actively develops future players via professional coaching and expanded representative rugby opportunities. In the Young Glory Academy, programs run from U12 to U23. Young Glory provides coaching to all levels of players, from coaching kids who have never played rugby before, to coaching players who have the aspirations to become professional rugby players themselves.
Head of Young Glory and Assistant Coach for Old Glory Stan South stated, “we want to show residents here in DC, Maryland, and Virginia what a great game Rugby is and to make it accessible for everyone to learn and play here in our community.”
South also added that they had a player, Declan O’Loughlin, who was a member of the Young Glory Academy and is now a full-time player with Old Glory.
“We are incredibly proud of the success that the Young Glory Academy has already had in transitioning aspiring professionals into the US Major League Rugby. O’Loughlin gets to play rugby every day as his profession, and the growth we have seen in him over the years is incredible.”
