U17s in National 10s finals

The long journey up to Leicester was met with the reward of a place in the National Finals in Litchfield in two weeks time.

A 0-0 draw with "Vampyres" (North Kesteven & Buxton) and the latters defeat 35-0 to Paviors ment that the girls only had to avoid a larger defeat to reach the semi-finals, which they did - after a shaky start (two tries in two minutes) - losing only 19-0.

This set up a semi-final with Kettering, who had beaten Thomas Becket and host "Jimmies" quite comfortably. Kettering looked favourites but after an early Kettering score Letchworth finally realised that they'd have to score points to stay in the tourmament, and began to break out of defence. A try by Nim, which she converted, saw the girls arrive at half-time 7-5 ahead.

Pressure on the line early in the second half resulted in penalty try, shortly followed by a third from Katie which - with Nims now accurate boot - took the girls 21-5 up, which was enough to see them through despite a late Kettering try.

With both finalists already through to the finals we now came "the final no-one wanted", and a repeat of the game against Paviors. However the teams were told they had to play and the result was a win for the team that wanted it a bit more - Paviors - who won by 22-0, based on three early tries in the first half when Letchworth's minds were still on the way home.

In the end though it was a fair result - Paviors were comfortably the best side there and look likely to be a real threat at both Lichfield, and at the Herts 7s the following week. Quite what the score would have been if a tackle from Nim had not brought an early end to the afternoon for their England U19 fullback (who had scored four ties in the earlier match) can only be guessed at.

The only black side for Letchworth was a hand injury to Hayley which may see her out of next weeks regionals (and possibly more). On returning home she went straight to Lister Hospital and the results of their probing is still awaited.