Imperial to face LSE at City Varsity
A budding new rivalry?
Imperial will be taking on LSE this year during a showcase event to take place in March. The event, christened the City Varsity, will mark the first time in a long time that Imperial plays against another University. (Though earlier last year the first e-sports varsity was launched at Gfinity Arena between King’s , LSE, UCL yours truly)
The City Varsity is almost exclusively student led, with some input from the Union, and at least for now will only be featuring matches from Imperial’s men’s and women’s rugby. This means there won’t be any medics playing. When asked if there were plans to involve medics in the external varsity, club captain of men’s rugby and chief organiser of the initiative, Josh O’Donnell told felix that it could happen but the process would involve holding trials and bringing medic players in just for the guest match.
Regardless, the launch of the City Varsity has been met with excitement. According to O’Donnell, the rivalry with the medics has simmered down over the years and there’s been a great appetite to find a new rivalry through an external varsity.
Whether LSE will prove a worthy rival remains to be seen. “There’s no bad blood yet, but we’re working on it” said Women’s rugby captain, Charlotte Gisbourne. Women’s rugby will be kicking off the event, followed by the men’s games.
Although it may seem like this event is putting Imperial’s rivalry with the medics on the back burner, Imperial’s internal Varsity with the School of Medicine will not be scrapped. Games will continue to take place as they have for the last 15 years and this year’s VarsityFest will go ahead as planned.
Whether the City Varsity will become a tradition will depend on turnout, but organisers are optimistic. As ACC chair Ellie Winstanley puts it, the games are “testing the waters because the people want the water to be tested”. Hopefully turnout will be high unlike the 2011 inter-collegiate Summer Ball which suffered a loss of £100,000.
And if it is, there are plans for expansion, with expressed involvement of football, hockey and netball but also other sports club that don’t traditionally participate in Varsity due to the lack of medic counterparts, such as Fencing and Shooting.
