Wooden Spoon is the children’s charity of rugby. We are a grant-making charity and fund life-changing projects across the UK & Ireland.  

Our aim is that every penny that our volunteers raise is spent in their local communities. With your help in the last year, despite the difficult conditions, we supported 54 charitable projects helping over 91,000 vulnerable children and young people. 

We need your help more than ever as more children need our help.

We are asking you, the rugby community, and our incredible supporters, to come together, in the true spirit of rugby and help us change young peoples’ lives.

The woeful performance of England during the 1983 Five Nations Rugby Championship is where the story of our history begins.

After watching their side condemned to the bottom of the tournament table with a 25-15 defeat to Ireland at Landsdowne Road, five England supporters seeking solace in a Dublin bar were presented with a wooden spoon, wrapped in an Irish scarf, on a silver platter.

Accepting the gift with good humour and grace, the group resolved to hold a golf match to see who would have the honour of keeping the tongue-in-cheek gift.

Just a few months later, the round at Farnham Golf Club in Surrey raised more than £8,500, with the money used to provide a new minibus for a local special needs school.

Stirred into action by a rugby routing, Wooden Spoon was born. Since then, we have been supporting children with disabilities, or facing disadvantage.

Thank you for helping us to continue funding life-changing projects for vulnerable children.

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