It started with a ball and a borrowed pitch

Long before Ospreys in the Community was a registered charity, it was a handful of coaches taking rugby balls into schools that had stopped playing the game. The professional club drew the crowds on a Saturday; on Monday morning, the same badge opened classroom doors in Swansea, Neath and Port Talbot.

What the coaches found was bigger than rugby. Teachers asked for help with reading confidence and playground behaviour. Health visitors asked whether the sessions could work for older adults too. Families asked for somewhere to play where a disability did not mean watching from the side.

So the programme grew — and in 2016 it became a charity in its own right, registered with the Charity Commission (no. 1169850), with its own trustees and a single test for everything it does: does this use rugby to improve a life?

“Nobody remembers the score of a walking rugby match. They remember that on Tuesday mornings, they have somewhere to be and people who notice when they are missing.”

Today the team delivers education, health, inclusion and engagement programmes every week of the year. And because that work needs steady, unrestricted funding, we launched the OITC Weekly Lottery: a £1 entry, drawn every Friday, with at least 60p in every £1 going straight to the programmes on this page.

The next chapter is written by supporters — the season-ticket holders, former players, parents and neighbours who play the lottery, donate and volunteer. If you are reading this, that probably means you.