Two day Saracens's girls rugby camp ONLY £10!!

This must be the rugby bargin of the year!!

Saracens are running a two day course (24-25th July) for girls at Welwyn RFC and (thanks to grants) it will only cost £10!

Based on the long-running boys' summer camps, the two day course is specifically aimed at girls aged between 12 and 17 engaging in contact and will provide an opportunity for players to improve their skills under the guidance of qualified coaches and professional Saracens players.

The courses will cover:

• Handling Skills
• Tackling & Defence
• Contact Skills
• Continuity
• Dynamicity in your play
• Support Play
• Ruck and Maul technique
• Leaching
• SAQ & Evasion Skills

Don't miss out on this amazing bargin - only a few places left!! Contact Jacky Shutler on shutler4@tiscali.co.uk or 0208 368 5325.

The result is in!

As you see, by decisive 17-12 we have our new header - and well done to Mike Alcock, whose design it is.

One or two people commented that the only snag with it is that it does not portray the younger girls in the U15s (or maybe future U12s) so I am playing around with balancing things with some images on the right. Just the one for now... when I have a bit more time I'll see if how another animated gif might work (like that which was popular in the beaten header design).

We've got a coach!

Good news! Dave Sharp has been working away for us behind the scenes and has found a coach for us next season. Or, more to the point, two!

So... introducing Simon Hill and his partner Kirsten.

Simon is plays loose-head prop for 1st XV and will be working with you for midweek training and hopefully Sundays as well, specialising on thetechnical aspects of the game. Meanwhile Kirsten will be concentrating on speed and fitness as she also has a background in sports coachins, mainly netball.

Simon has also said that he is ready to start coaching sessions "whenever you are" and will be at the presentation on the 13th, so you can meet him and talk to him about what you want to get out of next season.

With Diddsy (who has now become Danni on her MySpace I note) also on-side we should have the makings of a good coaching set-up next season.

Stevenage - third time lucky (and possible playing partners?)

Those of you with very long memories will recall that Stevenage started on the road to have a girls team at exactly the same time as us. Indeed in 2004 they had a truly kick-ass tag team for Herts Youth Games who murdered us in a pre-games friendly (and did quite well in the actual Games themselves - well better than our last place anyway!).

On the back of that they too set up a girls team who began the 2004/5 season and came within a (missed) conversion of being the first team to beat us. They had some seriously good players, at least two coaches who knew what they were doing, and then...

New Year 2005 came... and no Stevenage players turned up at the regional trials (two of three of them would have walked into the U14 squad that year). Then no show at the first Herts Sevens in Cheshunt. The team seemed to have disappeared.

The following season there was an attempt to revive a side at North Road. It was too late for us to get a game against them, but they combined with OAs, entered a team in the National Cup - and certainly did not disgrace themselves. Two teams were promised for Herts Sevens at Letchworth, then one, then... well, we had Paviors instead.

It was very quiet over there this year (county trials aside), but now we hear that there are making their third attempt. A new Youth Development Officer (YDO) has been appointed called Gareth Lewis (despite the name not obviously Welsh) who has been charged with restarting girls rugby again.

And basically we have said we are interested in helping. Admittedly this did initially result in the usual "check your pockets and run for the hills, its Letchworth!" reaction (what have the club been up to in the past?) but Heather and I smiled sweetly and tried to point out that kidnapping, body snatching and brain washing were all in the past and North Hertfordshire was now part of the civilised world, etc. Honestly, gov, would we lie to you.

Seriously, there would clearly be some advantages to this. They have coaches, a ground that is not as busy as ours at midweek, a paid YDO with links to lots of schools, grants linked to the establishment of a girls team, and so on. And we have the players, the contacts, the experience, and the general off-pitch know-how.

Certainly at U15 level it has the potential to be a match made in heaven (as even if Stevenage could only find three of four girls it would boost our younger team's prospects hugely) while even at U18 level a few more new faces would be useful. In addition the possibility for - say - having mid-week training over there every other week (perhaps on a Wednesday) sugars the pill still more. It even (looking ahead) makes some interesting possibilities for Herts Sevens 2008 ('cause - unless Hertford step up to the plate - it'll probaby be our turn again). And for Stevenage it means that whatever numbers of girls they find they can look forward to a full season of rugby.

Whether anything comes of it we shall see. We have made similar approaches to the north (Biggleswade) when we went up to the Bedfordshire Youth Games. Their coach claimed to have a few girls and a commitment to developing the game, but - again - his reaction on hearing the world "Letchworth" seemed to be to reach for his crucifix and garlic (obviously the black cloak was a bad fashion choice that afternoon) so the fact that we have heard anything back is perhaps not too surprising...

County news

Obviously you can now pick up the main Herts county news via the links on the left, but its still useful to highlight a few points from yesterday evenings Herts meeting that Heather and I attended, plus pass on some other stuff tha has come to light about Beds

County trials and squads

• Confirmed that there will be "First" and "Second" team squads for the U18s - but these will not be finalised straughtaway. The 40 or so girls to make up the two squads will be selected at the trials in September, but there will be no allocations to the two separate squads until after the first or second training session. This is so that everyone gets a chance to really show what they can do, and also ensre that no-one gets missed out owing to injury etc.
• Trails for U18s will again be based on mainly game play - but probably not as club-based teams but on teams made up on the day (and probably with players moved between teams and positions).
• U15 trails - also on the same day - will follow whatever works on the day, depending on numbers. If there are sufficient numbers the U15s may also run two squads.
• The aim is to have squads that are big enough so as to allow them to run throughout the season - even after some girls move up to Region.
• We will probably be asked to host a county game at Letchworth.

Emerging Schools 2007/8

• A U14 event again next season, despite girls rugby moving up to U15.
• Clusters of schools WILL be allowed (so if there are not enough girls at your school you could combine with other schools in the area)
• Obviously no dates etc. yet for any county tournaments, though in practice this will almost certainly be after Christmas
• But don't delay - when you get back in September start working on your PE teachers
• This includes Beds schools as we are told that there will be Emerging School in East Midlands County next season as well.
• No idea what is happening in Suffolk, Sasha - suggest you ask.

U12s

• As some of you may know we have plans about U12s, which Heather outlined yesterday.
• This includes running an inter-schools competition in November (with probably a U14 competition as well). Local schools in Herts and Beds will be invited (and Highfield have already said "yes". Etonbury sound promising too).
• In addition there is still a plan to invite U12s from local clubs to the county days.

East Midlands forum

• We now have a seat on the East Midlands (county) forum as well as the Herts one, thus recognising our over-the-border ambitions. Fern's dad is off to the first meeting next Monday. More about that later.

Header vote... its a tie!

Thanks for voting.. pretty much everyone by the looks of it! Every design picked up at least one vote, and in third place came Design A:


However there were two clear leaders from the start... and in the end, with 10 votes each (and two thirds of all votes between them), they could not be separated:

Design F:

Design H:

So the only thing we can do is have a quick run-off between these two. So its simple now, vote for one or the other. And lets make this one quick, so by Wednesday please...

Superteams - Update 3

The teams have now been entered.

However, due to some problems at the other end there are a few changes. These mainly affect the younger entrants as the 9-11 event is apparently for teams of 14! A slight oversight on the application form!

So the organisers have allowed us to move both of our U12 squads forward to the U14 event - and not worry too much about ages. This does, however, mean that everyone - including the U12s - will now need to be at Hatfield for 10am on 8th July (not 1pm).

The teams therefore will be:

U14 event:
North Herts A	North Herts B	Letchworth Girls Rugby U14s
Kate Summerfield* Beth Summerfield Aless Stevens Dominic Stevens	Lauren Armitage Graham Birch* Isla Mclachlan Alice Sunderland	Laura Wennington Hayley Aldridge* Arron Hobbs Kieron Threlfall
U17 event:
Letchworth Girls Rugby U16s	Letchworth Girls Rugby U17s	Swedish Meatballs
Jess ("Bunchies")* Natalie Emily Fern	Carla Sasha Hayley* Hannah (Sasha's friend)#	Nichola* Mel Simon Tomas

Notes:

* Suggested team captain. Based on previous Superteams experience, age, or the fact that they volunteered and no-one else did!

# Pinky has had to withdraw due to work commitments. Fortunately on the day I heard this Sasha also asked if a friend of her's - "Fields" from Reading - could take part. So - in the absence of anyone else - she is in.

All female teams: Note that Superteams is meant to be an event for mixed teams. If you are in an all female team there may be events (probably things like Sumo and Gladiators) where one of you will have to be the "honorary" male entrant. You may like to start to think about who this might be.

Providing referees for mini and junior fixtures

Girls who are currently on the referees course will be expected to referee some mini and junior boys games next season (as Joe did last season). This is not only because this will allow you to use your new skills (opportunities in purely girls games will be limited as you'll be playing at the same time in most cases) but also will be important in ensuring that the rest of the club supports us (coaching being one key area, but there are other areas as well).

We now have the mini and junior fixtures and it will be a good idea if we volunteer to provide officials for certain fixtures ourselves rather than wait to be asked and find dates clash with some important tournament we are playing in. Over the next week or so Heather will therefore be looking at both our fixture list and the mini/junior boys fixtures so she can suggest dates we can provide officials.

So if you have been on the training course she asks you to take a game on a particular Sunday morning it is important you agree to help, if at all possible.

A key early date will be 30th September when the minis are holding a big festival featuring clubs from across North Herts. Apart from being a good early chance for everyone to referee games, this festival will also be an opportunity to spot girls playing at other clubs, especially for U11 and U12, and point them towards the district girls U12 team that we will be attempting to create next season.

Midweek training 2007/8

The senior teams at Letchworth (that's the mens' 1st and 2nd XVs) are now going to be training three times per week - on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays with the first session being an indoor gym session. This obviously has implications for evening training for junior sides, with room having to also be found for boys U13s, boys U15s, boys U17s, and girls as all groups obviously cannot train on one pitch at the same time!

Two age groups will therefore need to move to Tuesday evening, where they will have the advantage of not only having more room on the pitches than on a Wednesday but also having the club physio available on site (as he is there Tuesdays and Thursdays). And because with the U15s and U18s together we are actually one of the larger groups, we are being asked if we could be one of the sections that could switch nights.

This is obviously not exactly what everyone will want to do. You all have got used to Wednesday nights being training nights for the past two or three years (though in the first season we did start on Tuesdays). It has worked well - last season the U17s had the whole pitch to themselves because they started later, which was great.

But the fact is that next season will not be like last - the 1st and 2nd XV normally train from about 7.15 to 9.00, so we are going to be severely limited on space on the pitch (and even off it) almost regardless of the time we train.

So let's not have a reflex "no" to this request (and it is a request - we are not being required to move). Think about it. Would it really be impossible to change days? After all some people currently cannot do Wednesdays and might even find Tuesdays easier. Comments and discussion (signed if possible) below, please.

New header - electronic vote now open!

Which is the best? Have a look through, decide, and then vote using the box thing below. Voting closes on Saturday (23rd June). If its pretty decisive we'll then go with the winner, very close we may have a "run-off" between the top two or three.

Remember to click on the picture to see each header in its full glory.

To prevent anyone voting lots of times (and there are idiots out there who might!) you will not be able to vote more than once on any one PC... unless you want to go to the hassle of deleting cookies etc. If this causes problems - because there is only one PC at home perhaps, or someone has already voted on the PC you use at school - then send me your vote by email.

Design A:

Design B:Design C:Design D:
Design E:

Design F:

Design G:

Design H:

If you cannot see the voting box above, try going here. If that doesn't work then you can send me your vote by email or retain your anonymity and use the comments box below. However - if you do use comments - please don't be tempted to vote more than once. I can track IP addresses so I will spot it if the same address votes more than once!

The party (presentation)

Just to let everyone know, that i think it will start at around 7:30 till 8
then food from about 8 - 8:30 ( roughly)
then the PARTY then on till .....................late i hope!!!
we deciced that we couldnt just charge adults to pay so everyone will pay on the door, ( we were thinking about doing tickets but i wont see anyone to give them out soo we cant do that)
so we agreed on £3 a ticket per person, everyone paying on the door
i need to know how many people are coming so if u could email me. (i will email you about it) so that we know how many are coming because of food wise.

see you there!!

A busy weekend

For the "off-season" there has been an awful lot of activity this weekend.

On Friday Me, Joe, Nim, Hayley, Carla, and Sasha were at King's Lynn for the East Region annual dinner. No awards this time - Essex, and in particular Basford (who start pre-season training next month - are they mad?) more or less swept the board.

So the most notable event of the evening therefore (well, to be honest "the most notable event that I feel I can actually report") happened five days earlier when Joe mentioned (almost in passing) that the dinner was in King's Lynn - not Newmarket as it had been for the previous two years, and where someone (ah hem...) assumed it would be again. Now that would have been good...

Having trawled King's Lynn for an all-night kebab house (Hayley showing her sophisticated palate again!) those of us who returned home afterwards reached Letchworth around 2.30am. This is a significant fact because barely eight hours later on Saturday morning Hayley and Sasha were at Twickenham where they joined Fern in the role of teaching aids for a coaching demonstration by the England coaching staff. This was all part of the RFUW Conference, where Fern and her dad - Andrew - were "representing" us. Hopefully we'll get some sort of report out of them soon (I have asked).

Then today, as well as the trip over the border (see below) about a third of the U18 squad were on day one of the referees course (including Fern, Ruby, Nikki, Katie, Natalie, Jess, and Emily... I think. May have been more!) - thus we (again!) virtually rescued a training course at Letchworth which had would otherwise have been dangerously undersubscribed! What would the club do without us? As above, a bit of feedback from those who took part would be interesting, if only to encourage (or warn?) anyone else about how useful the course is.

And coming up next week there are several more meetings, and the following week even more meetings, plus day two of the refs course. Does it ever end?

Oh - and...

• Heather reports that our fixture list for next season is filling up fast, which is good news...
• And Mike's produced a really great advertising flyer for the team, which we hope to get printed in bulk thanks to the club - copies on display on the 13th unless you catch him (or me) earlier...
• And Joan Threlfall is working hard on the tour, using her local knowledge (so you might be able to guess where we are going!)...
• And Hayley, Carla and Tracey are planning the party (get back to them for ideas and any assistance you can offer)...

... so keep watching this space, although there is no rugby there is still a heck of a lot going on!

Header: And one final (?) entry

Unless someone else gets one to me by midnight tonight...

Design H:
(With this one you really DO have to click on the above image to see what it would look like...)

Scouting in sunny Sandy

To Sandy, for Bedfordshire Youth Games. Our mission - to seek out new players and new contacts - to boldly go where no girls club has gone before!

And indeed Bedfordshire does seem a different universe sometimes. It is considered by many a "rugby heartland" - Bedford, two rugby clubs in the National Leagues, was (and maybe still is) the biggest town in the UK without a professional football team - so its almost total lack of any girls rugby beyond the one lonely outpost at Ampthill remains one of the great mysteries of local sport.

What is more getting information about what is happening in the county is quite maddeningly hard work. I suspect that smuggling state secrets out of Moscow during the cold war was probably easier than finding out what is happening in the world of junior Bedfordshire sport! And so a mission in person to this unknown land seemed a good idea.

The "away" team that beamed down onto Planet Sandy was me, Mike and Heather Alcock. What we discovered was that Beds Youth Games is a more low key affair compared with the two-day festival we have in Hertfordshire, but then Bedfordshire is a rather smaller world with only four districts (including Luton) compared to Herts ten.

Sandy School has some rather tasty sports facilities though - I suspect that anyone from any North Herts school would go several shades of green with deep jealousy if they had seen it (and quite what colour someone from Highfield would go I hardly dare think about!).

We spoke to coaches and players at the three U14 girls tag teams (Luton did not send a side) and the four U11 mixed teams. The lack of a Luton side in the older age group, plus the fact that the Mid Beds U14s was being run by Ampthill and included no-one from the east side of the district at all (a slight oversight we felt - and I dare say Samantha would agree!!) meant that it was not quite as fruitful on the player front as we might have hoped.

However the girls from the Bedford U14 team were very enthusiastic (maybe they are reading this? If so - hi, girls!) not least because they did not know that rugby was available for girls. Some seriously talented players in that team - and quite... "physical"... too (always encouraging to see a tag player being pulled up for such things - they are clearly ready for the next level!).

In the U11s most of the girls in the Mid Beds side were from Biggleswade (but no Phil??? How was the team selected?). They looked good, if at times a little raw - one girl called Hannah was seriously impressive though. Shame we couldn't get our North Herts Girls together to play them - it would have been interesting.

Obviously we are not going to get players directly from a U11 squad though due to the age group changes - so the main aim with this age group was to pick up some useful contacts for the possible U12 girls team and tournament Heather is planning. In the process we learnt that both Biggleswade and Leighton Buzzard are attempting to set up girls teams (indeed every coach we spoke to said that their club was doing this - which is obviously remarkable news. RFUW Development Officer Claire Sanderson should get down to Bedfordshire immediately!).

We told them about the Rochford festival, asked if there was anything we could do to help, and have now also written to both clubs reinforcing the fact that we would be delighted to offer any girls they may have the chance to play - especially at U15 level - and as a "joint team" in some fixtures if need be.

Ampthill also seem to have a new coach - he was running the Mid Beds U14s so there may be some hope of the game being revived there. And Biggleswade also have a female coach who wants to coach girls!

All very encouraging for the game in Bedfordshire. If the coaches and clubs involved follow up on their words then by 2008 there will be as many teams in Beds are there are in Herts - because the talent and enthusiasm is there in spades!

But personally I returned to base just a bit worried that in practice one of the most enthusiastic teams there didn't know that rugby for girls (beyond tag) existed. So will the words turn into action?

News from Canada: Weldon compete for the Ontario title

Meanwhile 3,000 miles away or so our Easter tourists I E Weldon have been competing in their Provincial championship - well, they were about 10 days ago or so but the reports in their local paper have only just reached me. Already champions of central Ontario (COSSA) they were seeded at number 2 for the Ontario title in a competition that included 15 other regional champions (girls' rugby is a seriously big game in Ontario!).

Weldon went into the event with more games under their belts than anyone else - 23 games, and 20 wins. A first round game saw them up against Senator O'Connor C.S. from Toronto, who they brushed aside 30-0. Lauren Wizowski scored two tries, Courtney Phinney, Laura Plahuta and Amanda Staples and "our" Robin Callaghan added a try each.

Next up, however, was Glenview Panthers, from Cambridge Ontario who were unaccountably seeded only 7 despite an unbeaten 20-game season.

Playing into what sounds like something of a gale didn't help our heros whose main strength - as we saw- tended to be their passing and running. The Wildcats had the wind at their back in the first half, but they were halted by Glenview Park's strong (well the paper says "punishing") defence. Glenview Park sneaked a 5-0 lead at halftime, and then added two more tries in the second half.

Moreover for some reason Weldon's basic play sounds like it fell to pieces a bit (had they been celebrating, Letchworth-style, the first round win?)and they made a number of mistakes when it had the ball.

Coach Kirk Wilson said that "Our own possessions were really our downfall" and added that Weldon's tackling wasn't as crisp and sound as it usually is, which led to even more problems.

"We missed some tackles," he said. "They weren't blatant misses, we just didn't tackle them enough to put them on the ground and allow our defence to get set again."

After the loss, the Wildcats were assigned what the Canadians call a "friendly match" (essentially a classification game) with Applewood Heights (from Peterborough, Ontario... could almost be an East Anglian competition going by the place names!) for fifth place with Weldon winning end of an close game 27-24.

"It was a great win," Kirk said. "The season ended on a positive note."

In her final game as a Wildcat, Number 8 Corie Lewis scored three tries. Lauren Wizowski and Laura Plahuta adding the other two, with Lauren adding a conversion. Amanda Staples also played her last game but it sounds like the rest of the squad will still be together next season (sounds like another team I can think of!) so Kirk is confident that they could win their local title next year at least. Kirk expects that Lauren Wizowski and Robin will provide take the lead next season (so no chance that Robin might be able to make a few games for her other team...).

Full scores and score information can be found here.

PS: Incidentally it is fascinating to see the reports on rugby in Canada, where in every case they talk about either "boys' rugby" or "girls' rugby". Compare and contrast that to here where its "rugby" or "girls' rugby". Sometimes a innocent thing like a prefix (or lack of one) says so much...

Header: four more designs

Four more designs have been submitted for your consideration. Voting will open on Monday - in the meanwhile take a look...

Design D:
Design E:

Design F:

Design G:

Bedfordshire Youth Games - tomorrow [UPDATE]

I know that apparently its "Fathers' Day", but is anyone planning (or available) to go up to Bedfordshire Youth Games this Sunday in Sandy to do a bit of scouting/ recruitment/ contact making?

Girls will be playing tag rugby at both U11 and U14 levels - so potentially there will be nearly 60 girls there we could sign up (being as, other than Ampthill, there isn't really anywhere else for them to go). I have some posters and I guess could run off a few leaflets. But I really do not want to do it myself - these things are much more effective if we have girls talking to girls.

Not talking about an all-day thing - just an hour or two. So get your father settled into a comfy chair, put his feet up, give him a few cans - and then off to Sandy, find the tournament, hand out leaflets, take contact addresses, come home. He won't notice you are gone. What do you say?

The Games are at Sandy Sports and Community Centre (Engayne Avenue, Sandy, Beds SG19 1BL) and are being opened by Charlotte Edwards (England cricket captain... who I remember when she as about 12...) at 10am, finishing around 2.30.

PARTAY!!!

hey everyone!,

Was just wondering what does everyone want to do for the party?
I was thinking that we could just have some food, then have a party with a DJ?
The only problem is we only have £150 and most DJ'S charge tht per night so if u know anyone?? i have asked the club to seeif we can get the usual one that they have but nothing yet....
could u just email me and let me know???
Thank you. Hayley xxx

hayleykguilder@hotmail.com

ELVs. Deadly dull - but could change the game you play

The laws of rugby union never stay still for long - if it is one thing that the IRB constantly do it is tinker around with them, either in the interest of safety or in order to make the game more "open" and so better to watch (but not necessarily play) - especially on TV. One reason for this is that rugby players are clever people and every time the IRB close one loop-hole, someone soon finds another!

Sometimes these changes are small things - like the changes in the law for the scrum which affected senior rugby in January. Sometimes its more major things like the points value for a try , or whether you can lift in line-outs (illegal until about ten years ago).

Currently doing the rounds is a series of "ELVs" or "Experimental Law Variations". The official documents on this are quite strikingly dull - eyes start to glaze over fairly quickly I find - but some carefully trained legal operatives armed with large quantities of caffeine and similar stimulants have now worked their way through it all.

Opinion seems divided - though there seems agreement that if these law changes do come in (and these things can happen quickly - in theory the new rules could come in as early as January 2008!) the change will be significant. In fact one referee's federation claim it will be "one of the most seismic changes in rugby's history". So what changes would we see if these rules came in? The answer is lots of things...

• Many offences at the "breakdown" (tackles, rucks, mauls, etc.) which used to be penalties would become "free kicks" - only offside, not releasing, or preventing a player releasing would remain penalties
• "Offside" laws would be "rigorously enforced" and would apply immediately a player was tackled, not when a ruck or maul forms
• The ball could no longer be passed back in the 22 and kicked out on the full (line out from where the ball was kicked)
• Mauls could be pulled down (so the end of the "rolling maul")
• Handling in the ruck would be allowed [though rumour has it that this one may have been dropped]
• Offside at the scrum would be 5m behind the back foot, not at the back foot as it is now.
• Removal of corner flags (so touching the flag would no longer rule out a try)
• Any number of players in a line out (though a minimum of two)
• Extra "flag officials" to mark the new offside lines

Why change? Well, Bruce Cook from the IRB says:

"What we want is a game that's easier to understand for players, spectators and referees, and to avoid the outcome of games resting so heavily on referees. To the casual observer, rugby has a minefield of laws, many of which are regularly interpreted in different ways by referees across the globe at every level of the game.

If you take the breakdown, for example - that's the biggest problem area. There are a heap of offences that can take place. Depending on what the referee thinks and what his assessment is of the situation, he will decide on whether he gives a penalty or not. And you'll have one referee that will penalise a certain situation and one that will not."

There have already been some experiments with the rules (see this match report) - and it is significant that the IRB see these as being a success:

Just looking at the Scottish games you're no longer seeing penalties occurring left, right and centre at the breakdown, and you get the feeling referees are no longer driving the outcome of games.

Generally it seems that backs love these new rules, forwards hate them - see Total Flanker's comments and this article in the Guardian last month.

What effect will it have on our game?. I suspect most girls teams will be delighted, especially the typical backs-based "southern sides".

However we (at U17/18 level at least) have always been rather forwards based - less so in 2007/8 thanks to Mike's coaching and the influx of great backs from the U14s - but it is still where out strength lies. It is, to be honest, a major reason why we can hold our own (or more) against theoretically "better" opposition - rarely losing a lead once we have gained it in what are generally low-scoring games. It would prompt a significant rethink about how we play our games.

So - watch the rugby press. Things that old men in dull suits decide in remote committee rooms thousands of miles away so as to get a bigger TV audience could change your game.

And those of you going in the referee course next month - why not ask what the current position is?

Party organisers found!

Hayley, Carla, and Hayley's mum (Tracey) have stepped forward and agreed to organise the party end of the festivities on 13th July. So if you have any ideas or suggestions about what the party should involve, or if you can help in any way with anything, these three are the people to speak to... not me!!

The basic idea at the minute is that the presentation will be from c7.30 to 8.00, food from 8.00 to 8.30, then the party from c8.3o to... late!

Decisions need to be taken on several things - like we have £150 for the evening coming from RFU but that may not be enough (with food and a DJ and sundry other things it probably won't be in fact!) so we may need to look at tickets for some groups (non-players?). So make you views known!