Trinity College Dublin is Ireland’s oldest, most prestigious and most highly respected University. It is one of top ranking universities in Europe and our graduates have gone on to be world leaders in many fields including medicine, business, literature and engineering. Trinity has a wide range of degree and postgraduate courses covering the full spectrum of academia (see undergraduate courses here).

The Rugby club in Trinity, Dublin University Football Club (D.U.F.C.), was founded in 1854 and is the World’s oldest rugby club in continuous existence. D.U.F.C. has provided an unparalleled number of Irish Internationals as well as British and Irish Lions. We are one of the top University sides in Ireland and our 1st XV play in the All Ireland League Division 1A – the top amateur league in the country. Our Under 20s team, which most freshmen would aim to represent, has been one of the best Under 20′s XVs in the country and is the current holder of the All Ireland Championship trophy. 5 of the intake class of 2018  were selected in the Ireland U20s squad for the 6 Nations Championship.  We have three under 20′s teams for freshmen to aspire to, covering all levels of play and field 8 teams in total – including a Wednesday SSI Women’s team and a Sunday Leinster League Womens team. See the club’s recent achievements in club honours. The vision statement of the Club has 3 strands: “a Unique University Rugby Experience”; a Club for Life; and, “adding to whats gone before” – we strive to meet that vision in everything we do.

Rugby Academy 
D.U.F.C. runs one of the most professional and advanced rugby academies in Ireland. With full IRFU/Trinity Sport backing and full time professional staff (including Director of Rugby Tony Smeeth, Conditioning Coach Ian Hirst and an all team physio and medical support team led by Dave Ukich and our Physio Manager, Tony Rafferty) our academy has been set up to maximise the potential of all the rugby players new to and already members of the club (see Recent Player Development page).

Fresher Rugby Academic Scholarships 
Trinity Sport awards a limited number of Academic Scholarships for the development of sport in the University context. These scholarship players form the core of our academy, however with over 200 players actively involved in the club many players in the Academy are not on scholarship.

Player Recruitment 
Our primary player recruitment activities are in respect of Irish students coming to study at Trinity College. However, we also recruit from overseas (including the UK, France, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa and North America) with students coming in on either 4-year degree programs (like Scott LaValla-Trinity Captain, Stade Francais and USA Eagles and Alan MacDonald-Scotland), Erasmus (like Cameron Falcon- USA Eagles under 20s) or on a variety of Masters programs. All players recruited to the club must be of a sufficiently high academic standard to gain entry to Trinity independently. Only when a player has demonstrated the academic ability to gain entry to Trinity College Dublin will they be considered for our rugby academy.
 For more information, see: http://www.tcd.ie/study/assets/pdfs/International-Student-Guide.pdf

A full list of academic requirements for Trinity College Dublin as well as the applications procedures can be found here. More detailed information including CAO points requirements for each TCD course is available at the CAO website.

We would encourage any rugby player with the academic ability to enter Trinity College Dublin to contact us. We are constantly on the lookout for playing talent and have the tradition, the ethic and the resources to provide a very well rounded rugby and academic education for anyone wishing to play rugby at the highest level. We look forward to hearing from you. Contact us and we will get back to you with more information.

An article appeared in the Irish Independent in April 2019 which sets out the Director of Rugby’s approach to recruitment and coaching approach. Read more here: