Alan Day -Saracens U10 festival.

Saturday 10th December saw a Blues squad of David, Elliot, Euan, Finlay M, Inigo, Jack S, Lewis Bradford, Lewis Brown, Luke, Marcus, Oliver W, Rory and Tom play in the Alan Day -Saracens U10 festival.

It was an early start for the boys, as we had to travel to North London for an 11.00 start. The mini-bus journey was loud, to say the least, thanks to “DJ Saffa” and his BoomBox and the boys were all in great spirits when we arrived. The facilities and pitches at The Hive were top quality, our only worry was how the boys would cope playing on flat pitches.

In all there were 21 teams entered in the festival across 5 pools. Oddly enough we were in the group of 5 meaning we’d have to play 4 pool matches. We were up against Verulamians RFC, Old Albanians RFC, Welwyn RFC and Amersham and Chilton RFC.

First up were Verulamians, after a tense start Chipstead took the upper hand with our defence making a big impact on their players and parents alike. When we attacked with purpose we made the game look easy, breaking tackles and off loading to the players in support. With a try in each half and a committed defence the game ended with in 2 – 0 win, a good result against a strong team.

Next up were Old Albanians, who were up for the game from the start. However, so were Chipstead. Again we attacked and defended as a team and to be honest there was always only going to be one winner. Two well worked tries and nothing conceded gave us a good platform to move on from.

The third game saw us up against Welwyn. Our defence was once again the key and we turned over the ball a number of times. This allowed the backs to open up and with some hard direct running, some slick handling and great support play the tries flowed. Whilst the final score was 4 – 0 (and we probably left a couple out there) we were only playing 4.5 minute halves, so it was a good win.

Our final pool game was against Amersham and Chilton, who were also unbeaten but had scored 1 more try. This game was one of attrition with both defences fronting up. To be honest (and not being bias in any way) Chipstead had the better of both halves and came close on a number of occasions but all to no avail. With the game ending 0 – 0 it meant Amersham were group winners and we had to hope for a best runners up spot.

After a tense wait for all the other matches to finish eventually it was announced that we had made the quarters and would be up against another Old Albanians side, but this time their A side.

After a quick warm up the game started and uncharacteristically our defence, so far one of our strong points went to sleep and we let in a soft try. The boys dug in and came back at the OA’s but were met with some physical defence themselves. In attack the OA’s came hard but we defended in force and for a while it was pretty even. Granted sometimes they led with the arm/hand but we can’t let that get to us and need to get smarter and tackle low to overcome it. The OA’s kept up the pressure and were rewarded with another try but the never give up attitude of the boys showed through and we got one back. This set up a tense final couple of minutes with Chipstead needing 2 tries to progress. As it was OA’s scored a third try at the death to win the game 3 – 1.

So we had come to North London and mixed it with the some of the best teams from North of the river, so going out in the quarter finals was no disgrace. To illustrate to you at what level you are playing at, the team we had drawn with in the pool stage made the final. This shows you were “on the edge of glory” and you should all be proud of your efforts.

After packing up the kit it was back in the mini-bus for the short ride down to Wembley where we were to take place in the Pride in Unity parade in front of the crowd assembling for the Saracens v Ospreys Heineken Cup match.

Resplendent in their McGee kit the boys did a lap of Wembley and were on the big screens a number of times (good value sponsorship I’d say) and then took part in a world record attempt for the worlds largest scrum. The organisers got the boys into their positions in the centre of the Wembley pitch and on the words of “crouch, touch, pause, engage” the scrum was formed (thankfully no one collapsed it) and after 10 seconds it was announced that a new world record of 750 people in a scrum had been achieved.

After taking our seats we watched a great game of rugby, won by Saracens and then made our way back to the mini-bus for the journey home to The Meads. Despite it being a long day spirits were still high and it was great to hear the banter (even if it were South London street talk, init!!).

On behalf of the boys and parents I’d like to say a big thank you to Anthony for organising the whole event and to Mark for his sterling effort in driving there and back with a load of over excited boys and DJ Saffa in the back.

Simon