Chris Carter loves his rugby. Sir Thomas Rich’s has long been a strong rugby school, but the deputy headmaster is delighted that the school is thriving on many sporting fronts.

One of those sports is cricket and the school have eagerly-anticipated fixtures against the MCC on 5th July and Gloucestershire Gipsies six days later.

“Cricket is the main sport in the summer term and we run 10 teams,” Carter said.

“Having developed our rugby programme to a very high level, in the last four years we have put significant investment into the development of school cricket.

“Initially this was in the form of improving our facilities with the development of a new cricket square and a new three-lane fully carpeted practice facility to complement our indoor nets.

“Having improved our infrastructure, director of sport Rhys Williams set about developing our fixture list and our 1st X1 now play a number of 50-over matches against quality opponents including Monmouth, Bristol Grammar School, RGS Worcester, Dean Close (two-day game), the MCC and Gloucestershire Gipsies.

“Along with two senior capped players – Captain Joel Price and Matt Cox, who both also play a good standard of club cricket – a number of our promising under-15 side have made excellent contributions to the 1st X1 early on this season including county under-15 players, Saxon Campbell, Tim Niblett and Sam Singha.

“The under-15s have had an excellent season so far and beat Crypt recently to reach the final of the County Cup where they will face Pate’s GS.”

While the cricket is thriving, the Gloucester school has also enjoyed great success on the football field.

“Our 1st XI have had a very good season, particularly considering the young age of the side, and reached the County U18 Final played at Forest Green’s ground,” said Carter.

“Noah Smerdon, who has been with West Bromwich Albion for a number of years, and Tim Ranken, of Gloucester City Youth, have been key players and, as both are available again next season, the future looks bright for the senior team.

“Two younger players who are showing a lot of promise are Ellis Beech, who is with West Brom, and Jack Jordan, who is under the wing of Southampton.”

Swimming is another sport at which the school has been excelling, much to the delight of Carter.

“We are very fortunate to have our own indoor pool and our swimmers once again dominated the City Swimming Championships this year,” he said.

“A number of boys are members of Gloucester Swimming Club, including Scott and Matthew Munden, while year 9 pupil Duncan Bisset has done wonderfully well to qualify for the prestigious Scottish National Open Swimming Championships in Aberdeen this summer.”

The girls have also been showing how good they are at sport.

“We run three netball teams and the girls have had a very successful season,” Carter said.

“Last year they went on tour to Malta and they are planning another similar adventure in the near future. This season the first team have secured excellent wins against strong local opposition including St Edward’s, Cheltenham, Crypt, St Peter’s, Cleeve HS, The High School for Girls, Cotswold, University of Gloucestershire 3rds and 4ths, Bournside and Churchdown.

“They have been very well led by Emma Folkard who plays the sport at regional level.”

The rugby, of course, remains very strong at the school.

“We’ve had another great year rugby-wise,” Carter said.

“In addition to beating a number of the top rugby-playing schools in the country including Millfield, Llandovery College and RGS High Wycombe, our 1st XV reached the quarter-final stage of the under-18 NatWest Cup and the under-15s won the NatWest Vase Cup beating St Paul’s School, London, in a close fought final at Sixways Stadium, home of the Worcester Warriors.

“And, not to be outdone, our talented under-14 side won the County Cup beating Lady Katharine Berkeley’s School in the final at Kingsholm.”