It’s time to get sporty guys and dolls.
Yes you read that right, it’s that time of year where we bring you something a little different to your regularly scheduled drag and music content, in the form of Hadrian Cup.
Our favourite queer rugby tournament is back and we’re super hyped.
Hadrian Cup is hosted annually by our lovely local Newcastle Ravens at the wonderful Percy Park grounds to bring together hundreds of players from around the UK.
Here is a list of all the incredible teams we’ll be seeing on the pitch along with the “Barbarians” combining players of multiple teams:
Aberdeen Taexali/Berkshire Unicorns/Birmingham Bulls/Caledonian Thebans
Clapham Feelers/Coventry Corsairs/Glasgow Raptors/Hull Roundheads
Iceni/Lancashire Typhoons/Leeds Hunters/Lincolnshire Lancers
Liverpool Tritons/London Stags/Manchester Spabarians/Newcastle Ravens
Oslo Raballders/Sheffield Vulcans/Transmanian Devils/Wessex Wyverns
West London Warriors/York Templars
The tournament may be a celebration of the LGBTQIA+ rugby community, but make no mistake when we say it’s also a fierce competition among these amazing athletes.
Our Union players ready to battle it out for both the Hadrian Cup and Antinous Plate in an energetic showdown.
Let’s take a look at the pools to see who will be facing off against each other in the initial qualifying rounds and fighting for their place in the semi finals, starting with Hadrian Cup:
Looks like we’ve got a lot of Northern action going on in Pool A and some Scottish action in Pool B, it’ll be exciting to see who comes out on top and gets one step close to the cup!
We’ve then got our larger side of the tournament, with 12 teams fighting it to take home the prestigious Antinous plate:
Next up we’ve got our touch teams and there’s two cups up for grabs on their side of the pitch too, so let’s see what the pools are looking link, Vesta cup first:
And last but by no means least, the other half of our touch tournament will be for bragging rights and the fabulous Attingo cup.
It’s absolutely all to play for and we know it’ll be an action packed day for everyone.
Naturally we’re going to be wandering around the event enjoying the matches, catching up with some friends from last year and filming some nice things.
This year we’ll be joined by a special guest host, the super charming and absolutely delightful Brian Davidson, who you may recognize from that little BBC show by the name of The Traitors. We’ll be putting him through his presenting paces and creating some cute content across the day, so keep an eye on our socials.
Now it’s all good and well us telling you about the tournament, but why not get a better feel for the event from some of the players themselves?
We have a nice little collection of chats from the 2023 event that you can view in a handy playlist simply by clicking this link, here is just a taster with the lovely Chris from our Newcastle Ravens:
-Insert cute picture from 2023 with the Liverpool Tritons just cos we can-
Oh and we will of course be bringing back our “Hot for Hadrians” challenge this year in full force, we know everyone loves to blow off a bit of steam and show their beautiful bodies.
Here’s a little reminder of last year, check out our TikTok for more.
The event has some wonderful sponsors, including our favourite local bar, Bobby’s Newcastle and our of course our friends over at Pride Radio, who will also be covering the event too.
If you fancy coming along to watch some delightful queer rugby and give your best cheerleading vibes, the event is free to attend and we’d love to see you.
Get yourselves down to Percy Park on Saturday 2nd of March from 9.30am!
