Season 2017-18 will go down as the most historic and successful one of the club’s existence.

Last Friday, thanks to the generosity of Phil and Sue Davies, the owners, the whole club descended on the beautifully decked out Carew Aerodrome Pavilion for its annual celebration dinner. The whole event had been conceived, planned and resourced by Emma and Jane, the leaders of the club’s marvellous Ladies Committee, who had done a marvellous job of preparing the night along with Phil and Sue, and a large number of willing helpers for the one hundred and forty plus attendees.

Everyone tucked into a sumptuous hot buffet provided by Scott Gregory (Caddy Shack) and his staff, which was followed by some highly calorific, tasty sweets and copious amounts of liquid refreshment. After the food there were speeches from the Club Chairman, Head Coaches and Team Manager, and a large number of special awards were handed out (see the pictures); the Chairman also thanked all of the bar staff and their helpers, and the caterers, who had worked so hard to make the whole event such a great success.

The Club Chairman started his speech by confirming the historic nature of this season of finals and League success, which he said was “a tribute to the hard work, dedication and determination of the senior, youth U17s and Junior players and coaches.” He then quoted a famous saying, that “ people are defined and remembered for what they have done and not for who they are,” and asserted that the players and coaches across the age groups would be remembered by many, well into the future, for their heroics and the entertainment they had provided during the last season. He then went on to list all of the successes from the season (see below), which he hoped would be commemorated on a special board to be erected inside the clubhouse in the near future.

The chairman trumpeted a long list of successes achieved during the past year and they included all of the following;

• Winning that WRU appeal and boosting the profile of grassroots in Wales, making sure there should be a level playing field in competitions in future and the First XV reaching the WRU Bowl Final in Cardiff; what a match, what a day out despite the agonising finish to the match.

• First XV League Champions Div 3 (A) West and gained promotion to Division 2 West.

• First XV reached Pembs KO Cup Final against Aberystwyth at St Davids RFC, first since 1961 and 1965.

• First XV winning the perpetual interclub matches for the Ian Jones Cup (v Milford), Palmer Cup (v Llangwm) and the Eric Brown Cup (v Quins).

• Second XV playing 13 games this season and helped Bluestone Foundation to raise lots of charitable funding.

• Youth XV reached WRU Plate Final in Cardiff and yet another great day out for the club, players and supporters.

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Pembroke A winning the annual Jimmy Hulbert Sevens, after a great day’s sevens matches.

• Tom Harding Jones appearing twice at Principality Stadium in a week, and making a phenomenal first team debut… a huge prospect in the making. Leon Stewart playing for the County U19s, who won the Welsh Youth title.

• U17s playing lots of games and appearing in the inaugural Mike Fry Cup Final at Tenby for this age group v Narberth… although they were runners-up we are very proud of their achievement.

• U11s and U14s playing at the County Junior Finals Day… proudly representing our club.

• All junior age groups completing lots of fixtures in the season. Some of the U10s and U11s making county squads.

• Record sponsorship for the club, teams and kit, matches and field boards. A huge thank you to everyone responsible for securing all of this extra funding, which has supported all sections of the playing side of the club and the development of our facilities. As a result of our success on the field more offers are coming in already to support the club through next season.

• Refurbished, painted and modernised clubhouse.

• New shower and heating systems in the changing rooms.

• Grounds developments to come. Working on procuring new lights for main pitch.

• Hugely enjoyable days out for the club’s massive fan base at Cardiff finals, which players at both levels were inspired by and really appreciated.

• The club’s Veterans team playing a few games.

• The formation of an exciting new Womens RFC section, who are very keen for the coming season ahead and training well under their new coaches Rob Griffiths/Martin Mathias and helpers.

• The club becoming incorporated in the near future, a positive move which provides a lot of protection for generations in the years ahead and the future development of the club as a whole.

• The continued work of a huge and growing band of committees and volunteers that work hard behind the scenes to ensure everything runs smoothly at all levels and in all sections.

• The continued warm welcome and hospitality offered by the Ladies Committee to all visitors to our club; everyone associated with the club should be very proud of this reputation and continue to foster this in the future.

• Some of our illustrious alumin doing well. We have seen Luke Hamilton gain his first Scotland cap.

• We have seen Jonny Thomas forging a flourishing coaching career at Bristol, who have gained promotion; and more recently coaching with the Barbarians against England.

• Dominic Day has proved he can hold his own at Saracens in the Aviva Premiership.

• Rhys Fawcett continues to develop his career at Scarlets and has played Regional rugby this season.

• Lewys Gibby, who has performed really well with Narberth.

• Jack Parkinson gained a pro-contract with Llandovery at the start of this season; although he is not now registered with them.

• Last but not least... the players at all levels have expressed their very sincere thanks to the many supporters, who have turned out and travelled far and wide this season, as this has sustained and inspired them to perform.

• We have conferred honorsary life membership on long term members, Guy Thomas, John Parsons, Mary James and Ian Martin, in recognition of their huge contribution over many years.

The Chairman reinforced the fact that the major strength of the club and the reason for the huge upturn in fortunes was the positivity, massive energy and focused, collective effort of so many willing volunteers in all sections. The audience was then asked to participate in an interactive session, where different sections were asked to stand to applaud, firstly all of the players and their coaches, secondly the wives, girlfriends and partners for supporting them and allowing them space to play, thirdly the huge band of volunteers working behind the scenes at the club to facilitate matches; loud applause rang out for each appeal. The Chairman also paid tribute to the huge support from the main sponsors ESS SAFEFORCE, RS GROUNDWORKS, SEALAND (Pembroke) LTD and a large number of other very generous sponsors, who were publically thanked for their contribution to the teams at all age levels and the development of the club, which had witnessed huge investment, facilitating the upgrading and modernisation of the changing rooms and social infrastructure over the last eighteen months.

Then lastly, the Chairman asked everyone to stand to toast absent friends and those too ill to attend, as the club had lost some much loved individuals and were aware of other stalwarts in very poor health.

The senior Head Coaches, Geraint Lewis and Kyle Davies and their team manager Nick Shiels then gave a detailed review of the season’s stats and gave out the senior team awards. Sam Smith, who had won Coaches Player of the Year, had also created a new try scoring record for an individual of 40 tries; beating the previous multiple award holders Sandy Alan and Dom Coleman, by a huge margin to win that award; whilst his brother Toby outdid his brother by three points and won the trophy for the highest points scorer, by scoring 203 points. Overall the team’s scoring record for the season was cause for huge celebration, because they had stuck to an expansive game plan throughout and this had obviously paid huge dividends; the team had scored an average of 40+ points per game during the whole season, a truly remarkable record. Tom Lewis won Players Player for the second successive year for his consistent, skilful and determined displays, and was roundly applauded by his peers as he received the award. A couple of the younger, teenage players who had broken into the squad, also received well deserved plaudits as they picked up the Supporters Player and Breakthrough Player awards, whilst Dan Gosnold deservedly won the Clubman of the Year for all of his huge effort and contribution on and off the field. Flanker Rhodri Walters won the Most Improved award after a magnificent season’s endeavour and some outstanding personal performances.

Afterwards the Chairman and Vice Chairman, then gave thanks on behalf of the club committee to a number of people for their contributions and service to the club; firstly a huge thank you and award to Anna Shiels, who had been the Safeguarding Officer for four years, but was now stepping down, secondly to Ross Davies, who had acted as First Aid Officer and was also stepping down after many years, thirdly Mary James and Ian Martin for running the 150+ club draw so successfully over the last three years, fourthly Tim Mable for sponsoring the Player of the Month awards, fifthly Neil James for his work as Physio, then Daf and Beth Palmer and Gemma Jones as the match photographers, Dr Owen Cox for his Medical expertise, John Parsons for his critical role in winning the WRU appeal, the club committee and especially Keith Nicholas for all their hard work. Finally, there were special tankards and champagne for the two Head Coaches and Team Manager, Phil and Sue Davies and most importantly a huge thank you and presents for the event organisers Emma and Jane. All received rapturous applause from the whole audience as they picked up the awards.

Jane and Emma, the Ladies Committee leaders, then concluded the formal part of the evening with their thanks to all of the volunteers who had assisted them to make the event possible; they also expressed their thanks to the owners Phil and Sue Davies for donating the venue, after which everyone had a thoroughly enjoyable evening.