Sunday 15th April 2007 - Kent Mini Festival U9 Match Report Players : Michael Rochester (Captain), Max Braddock, Jacob Ferguson, Matthew Tokarski, Elliot Peters, Cameron MacAskill, Harrison Lear, Eddie Tolmie, Alex Donovan, Aidan Stocker, James Golding, Will Pigg & Luc Hallam. Record : Played 6, Won 2, Lost 4, Drew 0. Result : Runners-Up Shield Competition 1st Pool Game vs Sevenoaks RFC - lost 5-0 2nd Pool Game vs Sheppey RFC - lost 2-1 3rd Pool Game vs Sidcup - lost 3-1 Came 4th in the pool and was put in Shield Competition. Quarter Final vs Whitefoot Lane RFC - won 4-1 Semi Final vs Old Gravesendians RFC - won 2-0 Final vs Westcombe Park A RFC - lost 4-2 Photos of the team in action are here - photos We had our standard bad first game. No matter how we work the kids up, or ask the Kids to get themselves worked up, it seems we always have a terrible first game. Sevenoaks were a good outfit with some large team members, but our team forgot the golden rule "Defence is the best attack" and took a step back from the first play of the match, allowing the Sevenoaks team to get up speed before reaching the tackle. Sevenoaks deserved the win and we did not look like scoring in the match. Then we came up against a rough & tough Sheppey team. The inclusion of a girl caused some confusion but our defence was better now and we lost the match due to a momentary lapse in concentration in which we passed the ball around in our own goal area and then missed a pass. Gig maintains that Cameron MacAskill got to the ball first and had touched it down for a scrum, but a Sheppey lad crashed in and got his hand on the ball and the referee awarded the try. Our rugby was better than that shown by Sheppey, it was just a little naivety in tricky situations which led to the loss. This is something that will get better as the kids mature and grow. We then had to play Sidcup RFC. Again there was a girl in the Sidcup team and the lads didn't initially know whether to kiss her or tackle her, but as soon as they saw how good she was, tackling became the order of the day again. 1-1 at half time, we looked the better team. But two breakaway tries (the bane of our team) won the match in the second half. We were then drawn against Whitefoot Lane RFC - a team we had never played before. We turned on the style and after showing some great skill, crossovers and side-steps went in at half-time 4-0 up. We then threw on all our subs, only to see three of the Old Elthamians start to don Whitefoot Lane shirts before running on the pitch. They got a consolation try and looked the more confident in the second half, but our defence held strong and we came out of it deserved winners. The Semi Final! Drawn against Old Gravesendians. Their coaches were very nice chaps and wished our team all the best before the game. This match was much tighter but we always looked the better side. We ran out 2-0 winners and looked good for the final. The Final! Drawn against Westcombe Park Panthers (their A team). We had to wait to start the match as they could not field a full team until their B team had finished a match. Strange eh?? I must admit it did raise a few eyebrows when we found out their A team were in the Shield Competition. And I'll add that they looked a little too cocky when they walked onto the pitch. Our lads were well tired by now and Westcombe Park had one brilliant player on their side who made mincemeat of our 70%-80% tackles, he was in a class of his own. We came in 3-0 down at half-time and there were a fair few tears and sad faces. But we wound them up and sent them back out. They played like people-possessed. Through some brilliant and dedicated play, we got 2 tries and looked to be doing well for a third when a final breakaway try finished us off. I must admit the fighting spirit shown in that last half of rugby was a joy to watch. It would be impossible to ask the kids to keep that sort of intensity going over 6 full matches in very warm conditions, but we will do our best to remind them of how that felt and will ask them to emulate it again in the future. I believe there were two star performances during the festival. The first being Matthew "Shabs" Tokarski whose great passing and sniping runs were simply brilliant. The second being Cameron MacAskill who put his body on the line and even had a go in the scrum. Both lads should be very proud of themselves. In fact, the whole team should remember that we were one of eight teams who received an award on the day - out of the 20 odd teams who took part. Briliant!! - Bring on Westcombe Park!!