Austin Elite Rugby & Tim Fitzgerald

Austin Elite Rugby Management announced that Tim Fitzgerald has signed with the team as a loosehead prop for the 2018 Major League Rugby season. Fitzgerald, a loosehead prop, is 29 years old, 6’1″ and weighs 260 pounds and has played rugby since he was six years old.

Fitzgerald is from Sydney, Australia and went to high school at St. Ignatius College at Riverview in Sydney and played rugby from age 11-18 until he graduated in 2006. After high school, he played for the Norths. He continued his education at the University of New South Wales and graduated in 2012.

He has played rugby for Old Sulian’s Rugby Club in Bath, England in 2007, Northern Suburbs RFC in Sydney from 2008-2013, and the Austin Huns from 2013-2017. The Austin Huns are the reigning 2017 USA Rugby Club Division 1 Champions.

Looking back at the Northern Suburbs season, Fitzgerald helped the team after round 4 gain the top of the Shute Shield ladder when he scored a try against Gordon in 2013. Tim was also mentioned in 2010 as playing lock for Northern Suburbs and scoring a try against Eastern Suburbs in round 22.

In the signing release by Austin Elite Rugby, Tim says about his rugby background that “I’ve played every position in the forward pack, but have never played a back.” He considers this confirmation that from a young age he has been, “…smart enough to choose brains and brawn over beauty and hairbrushes!” In more serious reflection on his upcoming experience with Austin Elite Rugby, he remarks, “I’m excited to be a part of this inaugural Austin Elite Rugby team and to work with the best selection of rugby players, coaches, and support staff in central Texas. This will be my fifth rugby season in Austin, and it has been a pleasure to watch and play in a Union which has made huge leaps and bounds in the standard of play, levels of the organization, and the always constant great supporters of rugby in Texas. I am confident this league will take rugby to the next level in the US and the world.”