Memorial Award
The Eliza Brewster Most Improved Player Award
Eliza was a medical student at Birmingham from 2021 to 2025. She loved her family, her friends, running, skiing, wild swimming, travelling, adventuring and she really loved being part of the Birds rugby team.
The Birds were her rugby family. When she came to Birmingham she was new to rugby and wasn’t exactly a natural. She decided she wanted to be good and put the work in. She asked a lot of questions, turned up to the training and by the 4th year she was starting on the Nams team and scored her first try in Feb 2025.
Eliza had her own way of being and was always true to herself. She was a great friend, loyal and encouraging, supporting new Birds. She always showed up (usually late) and then gave it her all. Eliza loved to have fun, lots of laughs and hugs.
Her friends mention her fearsome loyalty, the joy and enthusiasm she brought with her and her huge infectious smile. Things Birds said about her —
“I never forget Eliza’s magical ability to make everyone feel included and appreciated. You could have an awful day and she would make you smile even if it was just when you were with her.”
“Eliza and I were second row in the scrum in the Birds rugby team. She’d always give me a hug before we got into our positions, and it would reassure me or just make me smile.”
“Something I particularly treasure is being paired with Eliza in training pretty much every week and if that happened then I knew no training would be done! We would spend most of the session doing cartwheels and chatting about life.”
“In whatever situation I was lucky enough to be with her, Eliza was so genuine, supportive, kind, and always ended up making me laugh.”
“At rugby we had a drill where we were wrestling for the ball and out of nowhere she just started tickling me — which worked!!!”
Tragically Eliza died in an accident when wild swimming in Scotland June 25, just before she went into her final year. She lived her short life to the full, grabbed every opportunity available and made people smile and feel happy that they had known her.
This cup is to commemorate her, her happy time with the Birds and how delighted she was when in 2024 she was awarded “Most Improved Player”.
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