An Exciting Kick-off to the Season

Today a group of Hampstead u13s took their first long trip of the year, helping to raise money for the Sparkle Foundation and funding great work in Malawi by playing in their first ever 7s festival. A beautiful late summer’s day (getting a bit hot by the end), great pitches, and some great rugby added up to a great start to the season, though we really missed the broader team.

At first, the sheer size of the pitches was the major talking point - playing on full-size pitches next to the men’s teams was going to ask a lot of the boys - breaking into space and having 70m to run was definitely a change. The boys were up for it though and started off well. The first game against Cheshunt started out well - the boys got the offloading game going and scored a great team try early. Then the defence was working hard, jackalling the ball at the breakdown, and the added possession told, adding a couple of more team tries - offloading, passing outside and in, and even the forwards running support lines and getting the rewards. A concession ruined the shutout, but the teams then traded tries to run out convincing winners.

After a short break, the boys were back out against Basildon. This time they were flying - balls going back and forth, forwards in the back line, and putting the opposite side under serious pressure. The try count built, spreading them around the team, and we were very pleased to see the defence hold out, winning convincingly to set up a head to head battle for the pool with Bishops Stortford.

The match started a little lower than the first two, a bit of sloppiness allowing Bishops Stortford in for the first try. They then settled down a little, and started opening gaps in the tight defence by getting the ball fast to the outside. Trading long range tries, the boys got it back to 3-2 at the half. In the second, the game tightened up. A little slack handling let the opposition in for a try, came back with a rampaging run, support and a finish. Just couldn’t get it over the line though - a chance to draw where the low pass just couldn’t be gathered, and had to settle for second place in the pool, but qualified for the semifinals.

The semifinals were hard slog - boys put up a good fight but were outdone by the school team (apparently two weeks into training) and the first half against Ealing A team was a real battle. We were hugely proud with how they reacted for their last half though - raising the game, camping in the opposition half, and eventually slicing through out wide. Picking themselves up to draw that half was where we were best.

Overall a great performance- finished fifth, just missing the plate final on tries scored in the group, and a great run out to start the year.