Player Affiliation

As part of the affiliation process, all adult players will have the option to affiliate to their clubs if they wish. The RFU is working with Constituent Bodies in Yorkshire, Cornwall, Surrey and Eastern Counties to trial the Adult Player Affiliation process for 2021/22 season.

Club administrators and registrars may see that some senior players will show as affiliation requests within GMS. This activity can be seen through your dashboard and the system-generated reports, guidance will also be available for club administrators on the GMS Help Portal. A reminder about what the affiliation process is about can be found attached

What does affiliating to a club mean?

Player affiliation builds on the age grade registration process introduced to the game over the
last three years, giving all players the opportunity to create and manage their own online
account, and to link this account to the clubs they play for. It will allow two-way communication
with those who are playing the game to make it a better experience.
Once affiliated, club administrators will still be able to use the membership management and
player registration functionalities within Game Management System (GMS). In the age grade
game, player registration has been replaced by ‘Player Affiliation’, but it will follow a very similar
process to what has been rolled out over the last three season.

What’s in it for players?

We want to empower adult players to own their data in the senior game. With accurate data,
clubs, CBs and England Rugby can to engage more with players and develop content that they
want. Examples of this include playing statistics from inclusion on an electronic match card,
training advice or injury prevention and support. And over time, by affiliating, players will have
the opportunity to shape the ways in which they are engaged.

How will it help community clubs?

By affiliating to a club, individual players will remove the burden on club volunteers to keep
everyone’s information up-to-date, allowing them to focus on the game.
And with accurate data from players wanting to affiliate, clubs will have a better understanding of
their playing numbers and ability to field teams for a season, which is more important than ever
as we look forward to the return to rugby

Long-term benefits

For age grade players this will be mandatory, while for senior players it will be on a voluntary
basis.
We recognise and appreciate the efforts of club volunteers to make player affiliation a success,
both in tidying-up existing data in GMS and in encouraging players to affiliate.
In the long-term, player affiliation is intended to lighten the administrative load for clubs while
giving an improved understanding of the health of the game and enhanced opportunities to
attract, interact with and retain players