More than 3,000 children from primary schools across the Cardiff Blues region descended on BT Sport Cardiff Arms Park for our annual tag rugby festival.
The Sphere Solutions Blues Tag Rugby Festival was held across three days, culminating on Friday at the iconic venue.
It was the 12th year the event has taken place but by far the biggest with pupils from 226 schools taking part in 720 matches and 7,200 minutes of rugby.
Players from Wales’ Capital Region’s senior squad attended on all three days to meet the young players, who were celebrating the spirit of rugby in an uncompetitive environment.
Nadine Griffiths, Cardiff Blues Community Manager said: “It’s a big celebration of our game with the schools in our area as a finale to our season and it’s brilliant to see so many young players here of all abilities from beginners through to junior club players enjoying playing rugby and having fun.
“It’s an exciting day for the children, and they love coming down to the stadium - many of them haven’t had the chance before so it’s a massive deal for them to play on main pitch.
“Our aim is to inspire youngsters to have fun playing sport and enjoying exercise, we don’t run this competitively; it’s about taking part and enjoying the experience and we’re very grateful to our sponsors – Sphere Solutions, BT Cymru and Cardiff Met - for supporting our community activity which is so important in helping raise participation numbers in Welsh rugby.
“From a regional point of view it is also great to be able to engage with so many different schools and communities on such an enjoyable day at the home of Cardiff Blues.”
Primary school pupils aged 7-11 also had the chance to meet up with stars of the Cardiff Blues team to get some top tips from the professionals, as well as receiving their medals from BT Directors on the day.
Sphere Solutions director, James Hughes said: "It is fantastic for us to sponsor this tag rugby festival. Cardiff Blues do so much good work in the community and it is brilliant to see so many children here enjoying the game and playing on the iconic pitch at BT Sport Cardiff Arms Park.
"It is very important to reach out to the wider community and having 227 schools and more than 3,000 children in attendance over the three days is testament to that. We are very proud to be involved in such a wonderful festival."
Alwen Williams, Director BT Wales said: “It’s great to see that the numbers of juniors playing rugby in Wales on the rise – last weekend around 31,000 children and their families were enjoying the game at rugby clubs across the country – an 8% increase from last year.
“BT is very proud to support rugby and we congratulate the Cardiff Blues on this amazing festival - activities like this are a great opportunity for BT colleagues in Wales to connect with our communities through rugby, which is at the heart of our nation.”