Though not an official team, an England U18 "development team" took on the Canada U19s yesterday. As a team name it smacks of a certain pedentry as it would have been made up of this year's TDG girls - the cream of the age group - but RFUW field no official sides below U20 level so "development team" it was.
The game was played at Heythrop Park in Oxfordshire, where the TDG group train, and it sounds like it was a terrific match (though the weather was far from perfect!). Canada had thumped an "official" Scotland U18 team 53-0 earlier in the week and quickly built up a 14-0 lead. But "England" fought back with two tries - both unconverted - and it would be problems with the boot that would be their downfall. Always on the Candians' heels England eventually lost out out 19-15 - three tries each, but two conversions to nil.
Canadian age group teams seem to be touring Europe and North America every holiday now - there seems to be a huge long-term effort to build a strong national team over there (and, one must conclude, a fair bit of money as well). Canada are probably well ahead of the USA now (despite losing the Hong Kong Sevens to their North American rivals last weekend), and probably France too. It is likely that the girls who played at Heythrop this week will be seeing quite a bit of each other in the future!
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Congratulations John on getting a report in that I can't even find on the RFUW site.
ReplyDeleteWell done to the girls whoever they are.
Thanks to a) a tip off from a guy on the FIRA discussion group, and b) reports on the Rugby Canada website.
ReplyDelete