Nice one, Twickenham

Twickenham Ladies that is, not the antediluvian old buffers (I'm being kind about them for once - it being a new season and all) with the big stadium - or the hard-working denizens in the car park come to that.

No, a deserved shout-out is due to the aforementioned club who are justly proud of an excellent new website that they've just launched - http://www.tlrfc.co.uk - which for clarity of design, fun, and general all-around neatness beats most other club websites I have seen (male or female).

Admittedly a cool website does not necessarily guarantee a well run or successful club nor, come to that, a website that is updated regularly - which in the end is point of it all. There are any number of rather pretty sites out there from teams that either no longer exist or haven't bothered to update their site for years (Gateshead for instance) which does make things a bit pointless. However, good design is a good start - so hopefully Twickenham will go from strength to strength (maybe setting up a junior section, perhaps?).

One interesting little feature worth highlighting is their "players" page, which has brief pen-portraits of (all?) the squad. Its a nice idea as it both makes the players seem like "ordinary" people (rather than the image many non-players may have) and also makes them approachable. Joining a new club - even a new sport - is hard, so anything that makes that first step easier (as this does) is a good idea.

Certainly its a better design job than another new site - Ladies Rugby (http://www.ladiesrugby.org.uk/) - which aims to provide information on the (adult?) game across Britain (by the look of it as it includes information on Scottish and Welsh trials - but only English premiership club fixtures). Its a good enough idea, but at present contains little (well, nothing) that could not be found on official sources - let alone Women's Rugby Review. I also know that a lot of sportswomen tend to dislike the term word "ladies" (though I have never understood why). Still, early days.