How many people do you know who, when they enter a room full of people, a round of applause spontaneously erupts?

Such was the case last Tuesday at our AGM when David Faiumu walked into Turnbridge. The warmth exuberating from such a reception visibly shocked him.

Our ‘prompt 7.30 start’ got underway at 7.45 due to the fact that as soon as the queue at the bar cleared, more people arrived.

By the time we stated, there were nigh on 60 people in the room, all waiting in anticipation for the nominations to the new committee. They even stayed to listen and question Mr Faiumu!

Anyway, after reports from the various retiring officers, the new committee was formed. What was particularly pleasing was the fact that there are now quite a number of new, younger committee members. (Full details can be found on the website.)

As was intimated at the start of this article, there can have been few more popular players to don the famous claret and gold than David Faiumu, especially in the modern era.

It was because of this that HGSA decided to present Fuey with some mementos of his time here in Huddersfield.

These were a framed print consisting of a collage of images of the town, a mug for him and a shopping bag for Mrs F, both with famous Yorkshire sayings printed on, and a couple of car stickers (“Tek me back ome to Yorkshire” and, naturally, “Ee bah gum”).

One of the main reasons for David returning Down Under was so that his Yorkist daughters could learn to ‘speak proper again’, although losing their Yorkshire accent would prove very difficult!

Whilst he has retired from playing, he will be staying at the club to help develop Academy players whilst completing his degree at the University of Huddersfield.

Many questions were put to Fuey. Unfortunately space does not permit his answers to be reported here. Some we shall dare reproduce on the website in the near future!

Once the question and answer session had finished, true to form David did not leave until everyone who wanted to speak to him personally had done so.

We shall not only miss the offload and sidestep, but we shall miss the person as well.

All the best in the next stage of your career, David.