Whitchurch High School

Great start for Whitchurch Seniors first XV as we retain the King Edward VI South Coast King’s Trophy in Southampton.

A party of 23 players set off with Mr Williams, Mr McIntyre, Mr Rooke and Mr Workman in the early hours of Sunday morning to participate in the 7th South Coast King’s tournament. We arrived as holders of the trophy but with a very young squad including 4 year 11’s from the successful summer tour of South Africa we knew it would be a tall order to bring the trophy back.

Early signs where not good as we failed to capitalize on some very good chances in the pool games drawing the first 2 against Queen Elizabeth School and Portsmouth Grammar School nil all and then losing our third pool game to eventual pool winners Sherborne 5 nil. It was last chance saloon in the final pool game and an excellent performance against St George’s College lead to a 7 nil victory courtesy of a try by flanker Stephen Fresney and a conversion by outside half Glenn Evans. The score did not reflect the domination we had in the game in which the opposition did not look like scoring. This result was good enough for us to secure 2nd place in the pool and a semi final against the winners of the other group Bryanston from North Dorset.

This was a very good game but we were now playing with a lot more composure and rarely looked like conceding a try. With about 5 minutes remaining on the clock full back Fraser Robinson entered the line at pace and made a decisive break from our 22, he released the ball to winger Cory Ludwigsen whose pace from halfway took him past the opposition full back to score a great try and with Glenn Evans adding the conversion we recorded a 7 nil victory and moved onto the final.

Shortly after the end of our game we discovered that our local rivals Glan Taf had beaten Sherborne in the other semi and would meet us in the final. This proved to be a very tight game and despite having the better of things we were not able to score in the 15 minutes of the match which ended nil all.

The competition rules meant that a tense sudden death period of extra time needed to be played with the first score to be decisive. 4 minutes into this period of extra time we were awarded a penalty on their 22 and as penalty goals were not allowed scrum half and captain Fred Rowlands took a quick tap penalty to outside half Glenn Evans who coolly slotted the winning drop goal. A weary but exuberant squad then made their way back to Cardiff with the trophy.

An excellent start to the new season.