National Two North side Wharfedale is the unlikely home of two brothers playing internationally for Latvia.
Robbie, 28, and Tom Davidson, 33, are two out of four brothers who play for the Eastern European country, with brothers Will, 31, and John, 25, also playing for Latvia.
They qualify to play for Latvia through their grandfather, who moved to England at the end of the Second World War, eventually settling down with the Davidsons’ grandmother.
When the Latvian side of the family discovered that the brothers were playing rugby, they managed to get Tom involved in the country’s sevens side when he was a teenager.
He said: “I can’t remember much, it was a bit of a blur. I didn’t really enjoy it and I had aspirations for England Counties, so I knocked it on the head for a while.”
Eventually, the brothers were contacted again, and this time Robbie joined up with the 15-a-side team, which rekindled their connection with the national team. Since then, Tom, Robbie and Will have gone on to play numerous times, while John made his debut in May this year.
Robbie is the country’s highest points scorer, earning the Baltic side 209 points since making his debut. He said: “It’s pretty cool and I suppose it’s a nice accolade, but I was never really that aware of it until it came up. I just enjoy playing with them and enjoy the experiences that I get with it.”
Playing for Latvia, who recently moved up to 59th in the world rankings thanks to a 46-17 win over Finland, has taken the brothers to multiple countries.
Robbie explained that he had been to Cyprus for his second game, as well as visiting Andorra and Norway, whereas Tom remembers playing on a snow-covered pitch in Lithuania in minus ten degrees.
Tom has even been coaching in Latvia for a side called Livonia, on top of coaching roles with Latvian age grade sides and sevens too.
Rugby is not massively popular in the Baltic states, but there is hope that the national side can progress, and Tom sees potential for growth in the Baltic league created by Latvia and Lithuania.
He said: “It isn’t a big competition, but they are trying to progress within Eastern Europe which has been pretty cool. The main sports over there are ice hockey, football and basketball so it’s quite hard for rugby to compete with that.”
Back in the Yorkshire Dales, Tom is currently recovering from his second bicep rupture in the space of a year but is coaching Wharfedale’s backs as he recovers.
A PE teacher by trade, Tom has plenty of experience with coaching and has been coaching since he was in his early twenties. Now, many of the players that he coaches are actually his Wharfedale teammates, including Robbie.
Wharfedale have had an excellent start to the season with five wins from their opening seven games and sit just behind the heavyweights of the division, Leeds and Rotherham.
Robbie is currently their joint top points scorer, with 33 points and is thrilled with the team’s start to the season. He said: “We have started probably at the top end of where we were expecting to be so no complaints to be honest.”
Tom added: “In preseason we were quite low on players and lost a few boys either through retirement or injury. I wouldn’t say we’ve been shocked but we’ve been really pleased with the way that the lads have played so far.”
The club have been boosted by signing former Bristol Bears prop Jake Armstrong to help with the set pieces.
While they have some old heads, the first XV are mainly younger players, with the two siblings being some of the oldest members of the squad.
This arguably makes their start to the season even more impressive, but there are obvious benefits with having a younger squad.
From a coach’s perspective, Tom has already taught or coached a lot of the players either at school or in the juniors. He added: “At the minute there’s a lot of young lads who are really receptive to what we’re trying to do, which makes my life easier.”
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