Cumbria U17’s Play in 1st Barnard Castle Development Festival
Over the past few years Newcastle Falcons have ran an Under 17 10 a Side Festival at Tynedale RUFC as part of the U17/18 Development Programme across the North East and Cumbria. This year however the Falcons have not been involved in this organisation and it was moved to Barnard Castle School in order to use the excellent facilities at the school and Durham County had agreed to host this particular event.
The festival weather was very unlike the usual Barnard Castle climate as the sun was beating down on the firm pitches with hardly a cloud in the sky. This proved to be the key ingredient for what proved to be an extremely exciting festival with all teams producing some very good running rugby. The festival was played on a round robin format with each playing the others.
The initial games saw Cumbria beaten by a well organised Barney Barbarians side containing younger brothers of Matthew & Alex Tait and also Rory Clegg. Cumbria took a while to find their feet but after some inspired half time changes a strong second half was displayed with some very good rugby, Barney however managed to sneak a try at the end to win 17-12. On the other pitch Durham beat Northumberland by 3 tries to 1 in a very good display of efficient rugby.
In the second round of games Cumbria faced Durham and the game was very evenly matched and both teams created a number of chances which were halted short of points by some excellent last ditch tackles or errors. Cumbria led most of the game and going into the final minutes were on the attack with the score at 12-7, a very good turnover by the Durham pack however in the midfield led to the Durham Outside Centre racing over to score under the posts. The conversion was made easily and Durham won the close encounter 14-12. In the parallel fixture Barney Barbarians beat a resilient Northumberland outfit in another close game to set up an exciting final fixture v Durham.
In the final round of fixtures an improving Cumbria Team took on Northumberland, early Cumbria pressure resulted in an offence by the opposition and the blues took the shot at goal to post a 3-0 lead. Northumberland always looked dangerous on the counter attack and their fly half used excellent distribution skills to release his outside chargers, a strong Cumbrian defence however stemmed the attacks and resulted in a number of turnovers allowing Cumbria to again build their pressure. After a sustained period of pressure the Cumbria attack utilised the cross field kick tactic where Sam Pearson was found in space and he easily collected to score under the posts, the conversion was made to give the blues a 10-0 half time lead. Northumberland looked revitalised in the second stanza and tried to breach the Cumbrian defence but a typical stubborn display managed to keep the green outfit at bay. Eventually after conceding a turnover Cumbria were found short of players on the blind side and Northumberland scored in the corner, which was converted. This proved to be the final act of the game and the Cumbrian’s maintained their lead and walked out 10-7 winners.
In the winner takes all game a display of running rugby by both teams kept the crowd enthralled but it was Durham who broke the deadlock through a try by their left winger, who had looked sharp all day. Barney had the lion’s share of possession and played some of the better rugby however the Durham defence managed to repel them time and time again. Many players felt they had points to prove and that they should be in the Durham squad and this was evident on a couple of occasions with temper’s almost boiling over. Durham managed to hang on to record a victory over Barney which was a relief given the cheer at the end of the game.
This was an excellent advert for Youth and County Rugby with some outstanding individual and collective displays in the conditions. All the games were extremely close with no team running away with a game. This has set up an excellent U18 County Season from September 2010 where the 3 County teams will be joined by Cheshire, Lancashire and Yorkshire to form the Northern Counties Competition.
Thanks must go to Martin Pepper – Head of Rugby at Barnard Castle School for the use of the changing and playing facilities but also for supplying a Barney Barbarians Team to give a 4 way festival.
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The Cumbria U17 Squad from the Barnard Castle Development Festival
Coaches Russell Walker & Martin Grealish
Words & Pictures Liam Nicholls
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