U8

Match report - Romford/Old Albanians/Stevenage - 18th October 2009 

Last Sunday, 18th, was our biggest home fixture so far this season with one of the county's strongest clubs visiting us along with a new club that we knew little about?

Old Albanians brought under 6s, 7s and 8s, and Romford and Gidea Park brought just the under 8s.

Some joint training at each age group, assisted by some very willing and enthusiastic coaches from OAs ensured that all the children were involved from the outset.

Under 8s had two matches to play and lost the first 5-0 against a very strong OAs side. Having said that, OAs did not have it all their own way and were made to work hard for every advantage.

The second match against Romford and Gidea Park should have seen a Stevenage victory as we enjoyed probably most of the possession; however, we went down 4-2. Since most of our tries are team efforts we were undone by the six tag rule which meant that we lost possession on two vital turn-over’s to allow Romford try scoring opportunities. Oh, and of course the touch line once more conspired against us - really must get that pitch marked wider!

Try scorers were Rachel and turbo-boost Aaron who deservedly went over the line after running the whole of the length of the pitch trailing defenders in his wake.

Player of the week was Elliott for some great jinking, dodging runs.

Sunday coming, 25th, and the week after, 1st November, we have training at home, start at 10.30 so no match report for a couple of weeks.

Match reports - Tabard / Chess Valley / Stevenage - Festival - 11th Oct 2009.

Stevenage under 8s caught napping against very strong Tabard side. 10 - 1! 

Assisted by several tries scored from off side positions not seen by a 'first time' ref, Tabard ran away as winners of this first game. However, it was clear to see that we were putting into practice our pre-match tactics of 'turbo boosts' when we recieved the ball and so there were great turns of speed by the likes of Rachel, Aaron and Captain Kirk who was clearly on warp factor 9!. Great support play from the whole team showed again that Stevenage can really put a run of passes together to get into some great scoring positions, one of which was finished off by Roan. It was only our handling that let us down at the end...if only the ball was a bag of sweets!!

 Close run encounter with Chess Valley sees Stevenage under 8s just shaded in narrow 6 - 5 defeat! 

During the pre-match team talk we decided to keep going with the turbo boosts but to also add straight running to it in this second game - and how well the kids carried it off! We'd lost Rachel to injury during a try saving tag in the previous game so on a wider pitch with only six aside, we really took the game to Chess Valley. Great direct running from the whole team led to tries from Elliot, Kirk, Aaron, Roan and Tom. When asked for a Captains run Sean delivered and set up the final try for a great close finish! A briliant perfomance and a hint of the teams future potential - well done!

 Return match with Tabard is no joy for injury beleagured Stevenage under 8s. 12 - 3.

The ref from the first game was back for the last and the number of tries scored by Tabard was a reflection more of that than our performance. Within the first minute of the first half we were down to 6 players, with Roan going off due to injury after scoring an early try. Gratefully, we accepted 2 of Tabard reserves and they threw themselves into it. Capt Tom led from the front with several great runs and Elliot and Kirk were tagging everything that moved! Aaron scored a second great try at the end when he ran the length of the field - fortunately I could still see it from the other end of the pitch where I was 'resting'! Once again our support play was second to none, even though we didn't score as many tries as we would have liked and the tired state of the kids at the end was an indication of how much effort they all put into all the games.

Well done everyone!!

 Player of the week was Kirk for his great support play.    

 Next week we are at home to Romford and Gidea Park with still an outside chance of a game against Old Albanians - both teams will bring under 6s with them. Please arrive by 10.15 so we can get warmed up for a 10.30 start.

Come on Stevenage!!

Gary - [U8's Coach]