Andrew Searle, the new chairman of Dursley Rugby Club, had always been interested in rugby as a spectator but was something of a latecomer to playing the game.

So late, in fact, that he didn’t play his first senior game of rugby until he was 40.

Searle is originally from North London – he moved to Bristol in the late 80s before settling in Dursley in 1992 – and said: “There wasn’t much rugby where I grew up. We occasionally played at school but I have always enjoyed watching it on TV.”

It was one of his daughters who actually got his rugby playing journey started.

“She said she wanted to play rugby when she was four, so I took her to Dursley,” said her dad. “The club were very welcoming and I was soon doing some courses and helping with coaching.

“I remember I played in a coaches v parents game and afterwards I was asked, ‘What are you doing next Saturday?’.”

The answer, it turned out, was playing for Dursley 3rds!

“I think I started off playing in the backs but by the end of the first half I had been moved to the pack!” he recalled.

His daughter stopped playing rugby when she was 10 but her dad became a regular fixture at the club for the next nine years.

He used to play blindside flanker and he said: “I eventually became captain of the Nomads, although one season I barely played for them because I was in the 2nds.

“I played the very occasional game for the 1sts, but only if they were really desperate. I was a club player rather than a good player.”

These days he thoroughly enjoys playing walking rugby, something he took up three years ago.

“It’s like touch rugby, only you’re walking,” he said. “The great thing is that you’ve got a rugby ball in your hand. That’s what I like about it, plus the camaraderie.”

The walking rugby actually got him back involved with the club, not that he’d cut his ties completely.

“I edged away after I’d stopped playing because I found it quite hard to go to the clubhouse when I wasn’t playing,” he said.

“I still got involved in the odd project and I’d go along if there was a big match.”

These days he’s watching a lot more matches, of course.

He was working towards becoming club secretary but agreed to become chairman when Phil Sprague decided to stand down.

“Phil had been a servant of the club for many years,” said Searle. “He did a great job as the chair, so I’ve taken over a well-oiled machine.

“I am very lucky, we have a really good group of volunteers who do a superb job.”

The father-of-three has recently retired but he did admit: “Being chairman is quite a busy job”.

“It’s quite a big organisation because we’re affiliated with Dursley Running Club, and Stinchcombe Cricket Club is a section of Dursley Rugby Club.

“That is probably 700 to 800 members in total.”

The rugby club run two men’s teams, a Colts side and a ladies’ team, as well as a thriving junior set-up for both boys and girls.

Dursley Rugby Club have been a big part of the community since they were founded in 1953 and Searle wants to continue the club’s upward trajectory on and off the pitch.

“I want to increase our coaching provision,” he said. “The better we train and coach players, the longer they’ll enjoy it and the more people will stay in rugby.

“I also want to smooth the pathway between the juniors and the seniors so that the step up to adult rugby isn’t too big.”

Moving up the league may be a by-product of those changes but Searle says that while welcome, it is not an overriding ambition. He wants to continue the tradition of a welcoming community club where as many people as possible can play and enjoy rugby, and also cricket and athletics.

He does, however, want to improve the facilities.

“With my sports venue hat on, we need more floodlights and we’re some way down that path” he said. “We are even further along in our plans to become carbon neutral.

“In the longer term I’d also like to look at the possibility of having an artificial surface, not necessarily to play on but to train on.”

Searle, who has a business and emergency services background, would also like to develop the clubhouse and bar, so there’s plenty in his in-tray.

“I’m looking at a three-to-five year commitment,” he said. “After that I think the club will need new ideas and energy.”