Regional Festival Results Litchfield RFC 10 + 11 April 2010

Under 15s

Group 3:

East 17 Yorkshire 0
East 0 Scarletts 7

Plate (5th-8th):
West Midlands 7 East 5

7th/8th:
East 17 North West 7 (East U15 finished 7th)

Under 18s

Group 1:

North West 0 East 10
Scarletts 7 East 7

Cup (1st-4th):

East 12 South West South 5
South 12 South West North 7

Cup Final: East 0 South 0 (East U18 finished as joint winners)

A strong East U18 Squad went to the Regional Festival, with Herts. girls playing a substantial role. The Draw saw East yet again with the Welsh Regional Winners in their Group, a strong Scarlets team containing an number of their U18 players who played last week for Wales. First up for the East was a North West Team who had battled hard to hold the Scarlets to a draw. East knew a win was necessary and started well applying pressure from the kick off. North West tackled and defended well again but the East were too strong and won 10:0. Next up were the Scarlets and East were all up for this tough encounter. Unfortunately an early mistake in the backs saw the Scarlets intercept the ball and run in a Try under the posts. East came right back at the Scarlets and the rest of the game saw the East pressing the Scarlets line in wave after wave of attack and stout defending of the line by the Scarlets keeping them out. With two minutes left Chloe Bake made a break down the right but was tackled into touch just short of the line. The pressure on the Scarlets lineout saw them throw not straight. The Scrum to East was won cleanly and the ball was passed down the line to Alex Grant who was driven over under the posts. Emily Scott kicked the conversion to see East draw and progress to the Cup Semi-Final.

Here they came up against a resurgent South West South. From the kick off East attacked SWS. This paid off with a score in the first minute easing their nerves. SWS came back but the East defence was strong and kept the pressure on SWS preventing them from building momentum. In the second half built up the pressure on the SWS constantly attacking the line and were rewarded with another Try by India giving a 12:0 lead. SWS came back from the kick off and got their reward with an unconverted try in the corner, but the East defence held out for the final two minutes.

This set up a rematch of last year’s Final against the South. This was a Final everyone knew would be decided on by the narrowest of margins, a mistake or unlucky bounce of the ball. Every Player gave 110%, ferocious tackling stopped every break and neither team could get the ascendancy. Injuries abounded by the nature of the contest making it a stop start game. The East finally got the break with a long range Penalty but in the windy conditions it drifted narrowly wide and the game finished 0:0. In sudden death for 5 minutes, neither team making a mistake or giving an inch. Again East got a Penalty, this time out wide by the Touchline and again the ball drifted just wide in the wind. At the end both teams fought each other to a standstill and the Trophy for the last ever Girls Regional Festival was shared, with the East U18 being undefeated for the past two years, having won the Cup Final in 2009.