Old Yardleians RFC: Club News
Under 9s match reports v Bromsgrove and Bourneville
Wed, 28 Apr 2010 04:40
Old Yards under 9s v Bromsgrove under 9s B and C teams – 18 April
Bromsgrove have in excess of 30 boys at under 9s level with many of their players going to Bromsgrove School with its strong rugby tradition. The Bromsgrove A team was playing away at a tournament in Sutton and Old Yards hosted their B and C teams in an ‘unofficial’ mini 3-way tournament. Overall Yards drew their first match 4-4, won their second match 7-1 and came out overall winners based on number of tries scored.
The first game was an excellent game of rugby with both sides clearly demonstrating to the crowd of parents all the rugby skills they had learnt this season. There was excellent tackling from both sides, strong rucking and mauling, and some very strong running with the ball. There were stand out performances from Ben and Joe for the Old Yards who scored 2 tries each. Bromsgrove put Old Yards under excellent pressure in the dying seconds of the game and scored a try with the last play of the game to level the score. A draw was a fair result.
Old Yards dominated the second game. The tackling from all the boys was the best I’ve seen all season and with the hard ground some of the boys started to pick up some scrapes. Old Yards strength in the forwards from Harry, Oli and Dan meant the Old Yards back line saw a lot of ball and Joe, Ben, Adam, Alex, Hayden and Jack all had good chances to show their running skills. Overall Old Yards were comfortable winners with tries from Ben (4), Joe (2) and Adam (1).
Man-of-the-match for Old Yards was Ben for his crunching tackles, two in particular which saved certain tries, and his strong running which resulted in 6 tries in the tournament.
Old Yards under 9s v Bourneville under 9s – 25 April
Bourneville brought over 18 boys and they pulled together 3 teams of 8 players to play the Old Yards team 3 times. Old Yards only had a team of 8 players so by their third game of 10 minutes each way the boys were getting very tired! Overall Old Yards won 2 games, 4-1 and 2-1, and lost the final game 0-3.
In the first game the Old Yards forwards retained the ball very well and Joe Marcus was able to excellently take advantage of some gaps in the Bourneville defense to score 3 very well taken tries. Oli Harnett also scored a fantastic try running 10 meters with Bourneville defenders trying to tackle him but to his surprise he found that through his strong and determined running he made it to the try line – a great try.
In the second game the defenses were on top with some excellent tackling from both sides. The Old Yards tackle machines of Ben, Hayden and Jack did a great job of keeping the Bourneville defense at bay with some excellent try saving tackles. The Old Yards strong runners of Joe, Oli, Harry, Alex and Adam were also quickly tackled every time they got the ball. Bourneville had worked out that Joe was on fire and the clear danger man and they were very effective at closing him down and stopping him hit his stride. However he did brake through to score first, Bourneville then scored in return and then, after a great run from Adam, who was tackled when it looked like he was clean through, Joe was on hand to pick up the ball cleanly and score in the last second for a game winning try.
I think for the final game the team were already on the beach for their summer holidays (they were also probably tired from 40 minutes of hard rugby against 2 fresh teams!) and Bourneville were keen to avenge their two defeats. Despite some strong tackling again from the whole team, Bourneville were superior in the ruck and through their possession they scored 3 very good tries.
Overall a great last competitive match of the season and a very well deserved man-of- the-match award went to Joe for scoring 5 tries. Only one more Everest to climb boys – the match against the dads on Presidents’ Day!