Updates from Steve Tarrant - Director of Rugby
I was away last week but in my absence the U16 lads played DEA 2 in a friendly. DEA2 play in the Division above us and we were expecting a hard time, but the boys played really well and ran out fairly easy winners. The coaches and I will have to think carefully about which Division we enter the U16s in next year, because on this display we could definitely compete, if a few of the lads are staying at this age group.
Yesterday we played against Shatin College and Chan Shu Kui Memorial School in an U19, 10-a-side competition at the Police Club for the Breakthrough Cup, kindly donated by Shatin College. Our first game was against Chan Shu Kui School and we quickly went behind by 12-0, before fighting back to lead 14-12, before giving away a soft try to go 17-14 down. However a good breakaway, just before the whistle, by Messi for his second try meant we ran out 21-17 winners. Shatin then beat Chan Shui Kui School to set up the last game for the trophy. We again went behind before fighting back to lead 19-17, with just a minute to go. However this time, Shatin got the break and one poor tackle allowed their quick centre to breakaway, scoring under the posts for a 24-19 victory. There was some excellent rugby played and importantly all the boys enjoyed it, so we definitely hope to repeat this next year.
Today we had the colts sevens at a cold Kings Park. We entered two teams in the U16s and U19s, Police 1 in the Div 2 competition and Police 2 in the Div 3 competition. The U16 Div 3 competition is next weekend at Tin Siu Wai, which was just as well as many of the U16s have an important exam tomorrow and couldn't play.
The U16 team was therefore a bit of a scratch team but did very well indeed, beating Valley Fort 2, 5-0 and narrowly losing to the eventual winners HKU and HKFC 2. Because of the sheer number of matches there was only a cup and plate competition, so we were eliminated and are obviously hoping for better things next weekend.
The two U19 teams did very well. The 1st team started slowly losing to Flying Kukris 17-7 before beating HKFC 2, 12-0 and Aberdeen 14-7, which was good enough to take them through to the plate final. If we had started better against Kukris we could have won that game and been in the main final. Still the boys tackled really well and with some fancy footwork we scored some good tries. In the final we faced DEA2 and despite some desperate defence for the last few minutes we held on to win 14-7 in a very exciting game to win the silverware.
Meanwhile the Police 2 lads finished fourth in the group to just squeeze into the plate final against Causeway Bay, who had beaten us 17-12 in the group stages.However in a close run, hard tackling final, the conversion was all that separated us and we won by 7-5.
The U19s therefore won two plates in one day and attached is a picture of the very happy boys and coaches.
Next week we just have the U16 Division 3 7s and then a break before the big sevens weekend.
