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Jimmy Gopperth is ringing elderly people and it is humbling him
By Online Editors
Wasps fly-half Jimmy Gopperth has urged people to pick up the phone over the “tough” Easter weekend and speak to family and friends. The Coventry-based Premiership club devised the #MakeThatCall campaign with the aim of supporting their fans during the coronavirus crisis.
Players have been calling NHS staff, other key works, and vulnerable people including the elderly.
Gopperth knows better than anyone how it feels to be away from loved ones, with most of his family thousands of miles away in his home country of New Zealand.
“Easter is normally the time when families get together,” he told the PA news agency.
“It’s going to be tough. My family is out in New Zealand – grandmas and parents. It’s the same situation for me, having no family around.”
Gopperth urged families to have a virtual Easter Sunday lunch using modern technology, and said he was speaking more often to his loved ones in New Zealand due to the pandemic.
And he said it was humbling to ring up Wasps supporters and hear what a difference it makes to them.
He said: “The community is big for us at Wasps. Especially the elderly people who are fully isolated, it is about reaching out.
“It’s very humbling to hear how excited it makes people feel.”
Harlequins, Leicester, Saracens, Bath and Gloucester are among other Premiership Rugby clubs to join the #MakeThatCall campaign.
Premiership Rugby chief executive Darren Childs said he was proud of the clubs taking part, and added: “The past weeks have been tough for us all, but making these calls to our supporters, and hearing these heart-warming stories have kept us all going.”
Press Association
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Latest Comments
Steve Borthwick appointment was misguided based on two flawed premises.
1. An overblown sense of the quality of the premiership rugby. The gap between the Premiership and Test rugby is enormous
2. England needed an English coach who understood English Rugby and it's traditional strengths.
SB won the premiership and was an England forward and did a great job with the Japanese forwards but neither of those qualify you as a tier 1 test manager.
Maybe Felix Jones and Aled Walter's departures are down to the fact that SB is a details man, which work at club level but at test level you need the manager to manage and let the coaches get on and do what they are employed for.
SB criticism of players is straight out of Eddie Jones playbook but his loyalty to keeping out of form players borne out of his perceived sense of betrayal as a player.
In all it doesn't stack up as the qualities needed to be a modern Test coach /Manager
Go to commentsBut still Australians. Only Australia can help itself seems to be the key message.
Blaming Kiwis is deflecting from the actual problem.
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