Driffield RUFC heading for Twickenham after nearly a century of waiting

Not that the people of Driffield Rugby Union FC are complaining.

For come Sunday at 5pm, Driffield take on Havant in the final of the Regional 1 Papa John’s Cup at English rugby headquarters, hoping for a slice of club history.

"This is a once-in-a-lifetime occasion and we’re determined to make the most of it,” says Patrick Burdass, the club chairman and volunteer for as long as he can remember, whose phone has not stopped ringing since Driffield booked their final place last Saturday.

"It’s a very quick turnaround, we don’t have a lot of time to organise buses, hotels, a bit of media work, memorabilia.

"It’s been a busy week but an exciting week. We had 1,000 watching us on Saturday so hopefully that number head down to Twickenham to support us

"There’s a lot to do and in a few days it’ll all be finished and probably be a bit of a damp squib. People are asking ‘are you hassled and stressed?’ but absolutely not, there’s a real excitement.

"You walk into town and people are talking about it, there’s a buzz about the place."

The Driffield first team bound for the old cabbage patch are in as strong a position as they have been for many years.

Propped up by three further men’s teams, a women’s team, a female development squad and a minis section with a membership of 220 kids, the first team finished third in Regional 1 North East this season having only just won promotion out of the sixth tier last term.

"It’s a community club, we don’t have the pull of other clubs in the Yorkshire area," says Burdass of the East Yorkshire club that plays at Driffield Showground.

"We’ve got a good coaching set-up, we’ve got as good a group of players as I can remember. At our level you can be reliant on two or three players who have dropped down from National One, but we don’t have that, we have a lot of homegrown players.

"Because of where we are, it’s important that a lot of our players come through the system, so that junior set-up is huge. We’re lucky that our players have shown a lot of loyalty. "

There’s a humility to Driffield, certainly their long-standing chairman Burdass. When reflecting on the three wins they needed to get to Twickenham, there is no dismissiveness of opponents or disrespect to the years gone by in which they have not progressed in the national cup.

"Back in 2004 we got to the semi-finals and lost to Gloucester Old Boys by four points, so we’ve been tantalisingly close before,” says Burdass, whose team have the home dressing room at Twickenham and will play in their change strip of red.

"All the three games we’ve played in this season have been close. We won at Rossendale, then just pipped Alnwick on Easter Saturday on the last play of the game, we kicked a conversion and the referee blew the whistle. If we’d have played another five minutes we could well have lost that.

“Then similar on Saturday (semi-final against Syston), the lead changed hands a few times then we got a penalty try with two minutes to go. It led to two pretty nerve-racking minutes but we got a penalty 10 yards off our line and kicked it into touch for the final whistle.

"They’ve been three really good cup games and we’ve fortunately managed to come out on the right side. We’ve bought into the competition from the word go, and Twickenham is the reward.”