Joshua Ingram makes a blistering run
The Harrow Way School U15 rugby team competed in the Hampshire Rugby Sevens Championships for the first time in the school’s history this week. The tournament, hosted by Hampshire Collegiate School in Romsey, saw not only the best rugby teams that Hampshire has to offer all competing together, but some of the best rugby teams in the country!
In game 1, we took on the might of Kings’ School from Winchester. Within the first few exchanges in the game, we looked like we would take an early lead but a quick breakaway try from Kings saw them edge into a 5-0 lead. This soon became 10-0 but Harrow Way stuck with it and came back with a try bringing us to within one try of the opposition. 2 minutes from the end saw Kings strike the decisive blow and clinched the game by winning 15-5.
Game 2 against tournament favourites Churcher’s College was a real baptism of fire. Our boys never really got in to their stride and succumbed to a 38-0 drumming! Come on boys, heads up!
Game 3 against Ryde School proved to be yet another nail biter. The final score of 15-5 to Ryde did nothing to reflect the evenness of the game.
Game 4. A win! Feeling a little deflated, Harrow Way approached what was thought to be our final game of the day in a very relaxed “let’s just go out and enjoy this” approach. St Georges Catholic School had previously beaten Kings’ School in a closely fought game so we knew we had nothing to lose. As it turned out, it was St Georges who has everything to lose as our chaps came out all gums blazing! In a rampant display of power, precision and clinical try-scoring, Harrow Way (or as the chief announcer on the day had everyone believe – ‘Harrow’ School!) saw off St Georges with an emphatic 29-5 win.
Roland Jones gets the bit (and his gumshield) between his teeth
This win concluded the pool stage of the competition and now it was Ryde School, not Harrow (Way) School that would go home without qualifying for the knock-out stage. This was the result of an over-whelming points advantage in our favour.
In the semi-final of the Bowl competition, our boys took on Springfield School. However, the intensity of the final group game had clearly taking its toll on the Harrow Way team and they faded badly towards the end losing out on a place in the Bowl final by five tries.
It was a tremendous display of rugby all round and the real benefit to our team was seeing and experiencing first hand the standard of rugby at county level. As James Coward most eloquently put it “It shows us what we need to do to get the next level and demonstrates what we really need to improve on to be able to compete against these schools. I’m really proud of the way we all played though and everyone enjoyed themselves”.
I couldn’t have put it better myself James!
Mr Peters