England Lacrosse is delighted to announce experienced coach, Rob Clark, as the new and first Head Coach of the England women’s box lacrosse team.
Having been involved in the England men’s box lacrosse set-up since its inception in 2007, Rob takes up the England women’s Head Coach role with immediate effect and is initially tasked with assessing and selecting a squad of players to compete in the 2024 World Lacrosse Box Championships in Utica, New York, USA in September next year.
Joined by box lacrosse veteran, Scott Joyner, who grew up playing the game in the USA, as his Assistant Coach, Rob is due to hold several open training sessions over the next few months for those players interested in playing box lacrosse.
The first of these open sessions will be at the Oxford Academy in Oxford on 21 and 22 October and sign up will go live on the England Box Lacrosse website in due course.
Initially taking up the sport over 40 years ago at the age of 10, Rob has experienced all sides of the game, including as a player, an official, a coach, and an administrator.
Rob continues to play for his local field side, Spencer, and with the Southern Box Lacrosse (SBL) Capitals at box lacrosse events and remains a trustee of SBL, a charity he helped to found.
Rob was a part of a group putting plans together for the first England women’s box lacrosse team back in 2020 until the coronavirus pandemic forced everyone to stop playing sport.
But this didn’t crush the appetite for a women’s team and Rob is delighted to have been appointed the first ever England women’s box lacrosse team Head Coach.
“Having been involved in this journey from the start, I feel immensely proud to be given the responsibility to guide the first ever England Women's Box Programme as Head Coach to a World Championships.
“With less than 12 months to achieve this, we have some big challenges ahead but we are fortunate to be able to build on the work already done by SBL and Northern Box Lacrosse (NBL) over the past 18 months.”
England Lacrosse National Performance Manager, Derek Morgan, said:
"We’re delighted to appoint Rob as the new Head Coach of the England women’s box lacrosse team and we can’t wait to get started on this exciting new project.
“The growth of box lacrosse over the past few years has been incredible to see and we’re looking to continue that growth over the next year and beyond with the help of Rob and his coaching team, starting with the World Championships next year.”