Where grit meets glitter: Queer joy on the rugby pitch

When people talk about rugby, the images that usually come to mind are unmistakably loud: Burly men crashing into each other, thighs like tree trunks in shorts that defy physics, dirt-smeared jerseys, the thud of bodies colliding, and fan-cams zooming in on all the glorious chaos (and them thick thighs). It's a sport often painted in shades of hypermasculinity—testosterone-heavy, almost comically macho. And let’s be honest, there’s something wildly homoerotic about it too: Scrums that look like group hugs gone feral, locker rooms echoing with grunts and banter, and that intoxicating cocktail of mud, sweat, and bravado.

So you’d think someone like me, a flamboyant, visibly queer twink, wouldn’t last five minutes on that kind of field. You might picture me getting squished under a dogpile of straight boys, my eyeliner smudging as I’m laughed off the pitch. You’d expect side-eyes, slurs, maybe even a gentle pat on the head and a “maybe try cheerleading instead.”

But that wasn’t my experience. Not with Manila Nomads Rugby Club.

From my very first training session, no one asked me to dial it down. I was never told I was too soft, too delicate, too gay. I showed up as I am: limbs flailing, voice pitched higher than most, legs prancing like a gazelle. And instead of ridicule, I found encouragement. Instead of alienation, I found teammates. Instead of judgment, I found a version of masculinity that had room for me.

I wasn’t the only queer guy on the team either. Far from it. There’s actually a healthy roster of us—laced-up, bruised, and sprinting across the field alongside everyone else. We weren’t hidden or hushed. We were there in all our queerness, in all our glory, part of the team, part of the game.

Sure, there were jokes. Banter flew like loose mouth guards: Cheeky comments, playful jabs. But never with malice. It wasn’t ridicule dressed as humor. It felt more like a knowing nudge, a signal beneath the punchlines that said, “You’re good. We see you.” Their version of the bro-code just came with a bit more glitter. A way of saying you belong, not in spite of who you are, but because of it.

And as it turns out, I’m not the only one who found something special in this mud-splattered, body-crashing sport. I spoke to some of my teammates—queer players, allies, and coaches—about their own experiences in our little scrum-shaped community.

Take Dash, for example. Neurodivergent and queer, with a background in judo and boxing, they joined Nomads the way most of us did: quietly, a little unsure, and completely on their own terms.

“I just showed up to training and kept coming back every week,” Dash said. “It’s every Thursday, 8–10 p.m. at the Makati Blue Pitch. See you there!”

Dash didn’t arrive with a grand mission or a rainbow flag in hand. Just a willingness to show up, run hard, and maybe get tackled a few times in the process. Still, even with all that grit, the doubt crept in.

“Initially, I was worried about being accepted,” Dash admitted. “But then I realized they don’t care that much. It’s more about what you bring to the field and to the team. Be a decent person, and it’s reciprocated.”

That’s the beauty of it. If you commit to the game, the game and the people in it will commit back.

For Dash, playing rugby isn’t some dramatic political act. It’s more primal, more present.

“I don’t think of my gender or preferences while playing,” they said. “I’m just thinking, ‘Oh shit, what’s happening? I gotta keep up. To me! To me!’”

And yet, even in the blur of bodies and whistles, there’s safety in the chaos. A kind of clarity.

“Rugby feels safer than other sports I’ve been in, even with the fractures and concussions,” Dash claimed. “It’s global, rooted in community. It helps to know you’re not alone.”

Maybe that’s what makes this team special. We haven’t erased queerness or difference. We’ve folded it into the rhythm of the game. We pass the ball, we shout, we slam into each other. Somewhere in the mud and sweat, we start to believe we belong. Not as an exception, but as part of the play.

Sometimes, that belief takes physical form. Dash remembers it clearly, the moment they felt truly seen.

“Scoring my first try during my first tournament,” Dash pointed. “Ninety percent luck, I’d say—but it counted.”

It always counts.

But it’s not just queer folks who are shaping this team. What makes the Nomads special is that we’re surrounded by allies—teammates and coaches who don’t just make space for us, but actively protect and celebrate it.

One ally, a longtime Nomad and a youth coach, pointed out that inclusivity isn’t an add-on in rugby. It’s part of the architecture.

“Inclusivity in a sport like rugby is innate. You have 15 different players on the field, each with different physical requirements and jobs to do. With such a huge team working together, inclusivity is embedded into the game. This is what welcomes such a diverse mix of people. No matter the gender, age, physical fitness, or sexual orientation, you’re welcome in the sport.”

They also spoke to how queerness doesn’t fit into easy boxes—something they’ve learned firsthand from teammates and youth players. 

“There really is no particular ‘look’ or ‘vibe’ when it comes to queerness. We have these very masculine players who come out as gay years later. We have players in seemingly straight relationships, only to find out they’re bi. You realize you really can’t put queer people into a box.”

Still, they’re quick to acknowledge that rugby comes with its own baggage.

“Unfortunately, rugby is, first and foremost, a white man’s sport. And with that comes a patriarchal, archaic culture. Even now, despite being a team based in the Philippines, we have a good number of foreigners. Maintaining a safe and supportive team culture means staying critical—recognizing what’s not acceptable and doing the work to change it.”

That kind of leadership is echoed by our coaches too, especially those working with younger players.

“When I coached the youth team, a lot of my female players had girlfriends. Some even formed romantic relationships within the team. At first, it was kind of unspoken, but eventually everyone was open and comfortable sharing their relationships with me and the rest of the team.”

And then there was one player—flamboyant, fast, and absolutely fearless.

“We have this youth player who’s super flamboyant, but he’s one of the bravest and fastest wingers in the team. Everyone acknowledges his efforts. Nobody questions it.”

Of course, there have been moments of tension. But they didn’t go unaddressed.

“I’ve had male youth players who were very outwardly queer. There was a point where one of them was being picked on by another player. We pulled the kid aside and told him directly: homophobic remarks have no place here. Not on this team, not in this sport, not in this club. We made it clear that if it happened again, he’d sit out the rest of the season. He apologized and hasn’t acted that way since.”

For them, inclusion isn’t just about waving flags—it’s about accountability.

“We need to establish a culture of calling each other out and embracing change. Prejudice is learned behavior. We can unlearn it. But it has to start with recognizing wrongs and being brave enough to name them,” they explained. 

Also, queerness in rugby doesn’t just show up in cheeky banter or glittered bro-code. It also lives in the silent power of women who show up, hold space, and hit back. Hard.

Pauline, a member of the Manila Nomads Rogues and the Philippine Rising Stars (our national development team), has played touch rugby for over a decade. Contact rugby, though, was a different beast. Years of injuries made her wary. Still, something shifted.

“Last year, I finally started feeling confident enough in my body to give contact rugby a try,” Pauline shared. “My partner, who had been with the team for a couple of years at that point, invited me to a training session, and I was immediately drawn to the sport and the community.”

Even with experience under her belt, the fear of being “too much” lingered—because queer athletes, especially women, often carry the weight of safety in a world that sees difference as threat.

“These spaces don’t exist in a vacuum,” Pauline said. “They reflect the wider political climate around the acceptance of queerness. And because of that, I’ve often felt the need to shrink parts of myself that are meant to be celebrated.”

But rugby gave Pauline another option. A full-contact reclamation of her body, her voice, her space.

“As a queer woman, simply existing in this space already subverts the norms,” Pauline explained. “Amidst all these contradictions, playing rugby can be freeing—a reclamation of my body and identity on my own terms.”

The shift wasn’t just mental. It was deeply physical. Tactile.

“I feel every hit, every tackle, every tumble to the ground. Then I get back up and realize how much strength and power my body actually holds. Similarly, embracing my queerness means channeling that feeling of power by taking up space unapologetically.”

Of course, doubt lingered at the start. But the women’s rugby scene in the Philippines, she said, has done something rare. It has made room.

“There’s something inherently subversive about women thriving in a space that society often tells us isn’t meant for us. That act alone pushes us to open our minds to the many non-traditional ways women express themselves, including how we express our sexuality.”

Still, what anchored Pauline the most wasn’t a single epic moment—it was the soft, specific ones. The ones that often go unnoticed.

“Pre-game hair braiding, water break chismis, post-tournament happy crying. These seemingly trivial moments are central to our experience as female athletes and create a sense of comfort and belonging. In those moments, we feel understood without needing to explain, seen without having to fight to be noticed.”

“As an athlete, you can truly show up when you know you’re recognized and accepted. And that includes every part of who you are, including your queerness.” Pauline shared.

What I found in rugby wasn’t just a sport. It was a kind of chosen family in cleats.

What began as a space I feared might crush me—literally and figuratively—turned out to be one where I could run, sweat, scream, and exist exactly as I am. There’s still the grit and the chaos. The rough tackles, ripped shorts, and broken faces. But now they come with something gentler underneath: camaraderie, mutual respect, and a surprising tenderness wrapped in mud and muscle.

People like me, Dash, Pauline, and others I’ve met on the field show me that queerness doesn’t need to be left on the sidelines. It can run center pitch, tackle and be tackled, fall and get back up just like anyone else. In a sport obsessed with impact, maybe the biggest one it’s made is on us—queer folks who never thought we’d belong, but found out we did.

So no, I didn’t trade eyeliner for eye black. I kept both. And on Thursday nights under the floodlights in Makati, I found something a little magical. A version of rugby that lets you be soft and strong, loud and light-footed, fierce and fabulous. A version that challenges the idea that there’s only one way to be a man or a player, and leaves it face-down in the mud.

And isn’t that the point of sports, at its best? Not just to play hard, but to play together. To make room. To make space. To make a try—and sometimes, to make a home.