As we prepare for the Club’s 150th birthday in 2022 there are no doubt a number of players and supporters who don’t know a lot about the Goulburn Rugby Club.

Here are a few short dot points:

• We are the oldest country rugby club in Australia, and the fourth oldest Australian rugby club.
• The Goulburn Rugby Club was first formed on July 22, 1872 – two years before St Pat’s College existed – thanks largely to Valentine Blomfield Riley. Riley played for and captained Sydney University from 1869-1872 and when he moved to Goulburn to set up a surveying company with his father, he took the rugby religion with him.
• In 1874, two of Riley’s former teammates (brothers Monte and Richard Arnold) asked him if Goulburn would help form Australia’s first official rugby competition. Riley jumped at the chance and the Southern Rugby Union (the predecessor to NSW Rugby Union) was formed with Goulburn a founding member. Sydney teams frequently travelled to Goulburn for games.
• In the 1880s to early 1900s a thriving rugby competition was based in Goulburn.
• On 14^th June, 1899 the British Lions started their Australian tour against the Goulburn rep side (The Central Southern Rugby Union), beating the locals by 11-3 at the Old Showground.
• The following year, on 28^th September 1900, having won the Sydney premiership, Glebe came to Goulburn for a game but returned to Sydney with a 26-6 loss to Goulburn against them.
• Goulburn Rugby suspended play for both world wars, and on both occasions took a while to get back up on its feet again.
• Numerous Wallabies have played for the Dirty Reds. Several, such as Bruce Bailey and Simon Poidevin, began their senior rugby careers with the club before going on to wear the green and gold.
• Our home ground is Rugby Park, Goulburn. We often refer to the whole precinct as Poidevin Oval, which was opened in 1996 and is our main ground, but technically that’s just one of two grounds. The second ground, Klem Oval (named after numerous Klem family members to play for and volunteer for the club) will be officially opened this year.
• The club has won a bunch of senior grand finals. After winning a swag of premiership in the 1970s the club went through a dry spell winning one second grade title in the 80s, and one third grade title in the 90s. Since 2007, however, the senior club has won 13 premierships… eight of those in first grade. The most recent were wins in both undefeated first and second grade sides in 2020, and the year before that, by the inaugural Goulburn women’ side in an undefeated season.
• The women’s team has existed for almost a decade in a few forms… initially playing invitational games of touch on special Club days, then regular sevens competitions. In 2019, as mentioned, they won the ACT women’s 10s competition and last year they made their debut in XVs rugby,
• Goulburn seniors have played in ACT, Southern Tablelands, Illawarra and Monaro competitions. 
• In addition to senior and secondary school-aged teams, the club usually hosts a primary school-aged competition on Friday nights (Fizzy Reds) often featuring between 150-250 players, and at the other end of the spectrum, we field a golden oldies team (Fermented Reds).

The Goulburn Rugby Club prides itself on being a family club and we welcome all of you… players, supporters and friends… into the Goulburn Rugby family.

Browse around this website… you’ll find a whole host of stuff including photo galleries, match reports and player stats.

In terms of social media, you’ll find us on Twitter, Instagram and a number of Facebook pages and groups (see links in the menu above).