RUGBY RECOGNISES TAYLOR’S TRIUMPHS
Taylor Gough has been honoured by English rugby’s players and governing bodies with receipt of the RPA Blyth Spirit Award for an individual who has shown remarkable courage in the face of adversity.
A back-row forward who came through the Leicester Tigers academy to play senior rugby, Taylor has retained his love of sport and competition since teaming up with the Matt Hampson Foundation following a spinal injury in 2020/21. He has enjoyed success with the Tigers wheelchair rugby team, participated in adaptive fitness competition, qualified as a personal trainer and reached his first para-canoe European Championships this summer.
Taylor was at the presentation evening at The Brewery in London for The Rugby Awards which brought together Premiership Rugby, the Rugby Football Union, Rugby Players Association (RPA) and Premiership Women’s Rugby for the first time to showcase the best of English rugby.
Matt Hampson himself received the Blyth Spirit award in 2015, with other recipients including the Foundation’s first-ever beneficiary Henry Fraser and Matt’s good friends Doddie Weir and Ed Slater. All Blacks legend Jonah Lomu, former Wallabies fly-half Michael Lynagh and rugby league legend Kevin Sinfield, who continues to support the MND community, are also among the former winners.
Foundation ambassador George Ford, who has been named in the Premiership Team of the Season, was among the nominations for Gallagher Player of the Season, an award which went to Gloucester scrum-half Tomos Williams; and Joseph Woodward, another Leicester Tigers academy graduate, was shortlisted for Breakthrough Player, a category won by Northampton’s Henry Pollock.
