Coach's Reports
Coach's Report December 2011
The U6s this season under the wonderful Dawn & Jack has proven inspirational....lots of little Rugby Bugs coming and enjoying their first taste of Rugby and thoroughly enjoying it; their excited chatter, glowing faces and Jack’s exhaustion after every session is testament to all the great things going on.
Cheetahs match report, Hadleigh, 04/12/11
Winter is certainly on its way and the balmy September and October days when most of the boys set out on their rugby experience are very much a thing of the past. The Cheetah’s away trip to Hadleigh was a reminder that whilst the boys have all come very far, there is still away to go in terms of learning and applying the core skills of the game week-in and week-out. Playing rugby, and ultimately playing rugby well, is about learning from defeat as-well-as winning. Hadleigh proved a stern test for our excellent Cheetahs team; a team, which included some of our best try scorers and taggers.
Match 1 a keenly fought 3-3 draw – saw Hadleigh go ahead twice, with the Cheetahs equalising twice before themselves going ahead 3-2, before Hadleigh fought back to equalise at the death. Well done to Seth, Sam Wright and Kajeai for some very effective tagging in the second half and Sam Hyatt for two excellent and hard-fought tries and leaving the opposition in his wake after bustling through the centre of the Hadleigh team.
Match 2 saw Hadleigh scoring two run-away tries scored close to the centre of the pitch as-well-as two tries following some excellent tagging from Victor, Oliver and Finlay. Going into the break, the Cheetahs conceded a well-worked Hadleigh try to go to 4-1 before two tries from the Cheetahs and a final try from Hadleigh left the match 5-3 to Hadleigh. Well done to Harvey for a blinding and arrow-straight run up the left wing, only to miss out on a try by a stray boot into touch 5 metres from the line. A special mention to Charlie Read for running his socks (and fluorescent boots!) off for both games.
Three key lessons:
1. Run forward with the ball, especially from the restart;
2. When tagging get close to the opposing player, level with his hips: if you are diving to grab the tag you’re usually too far away;
3. Keep away from the touch-line, especially on a narrow pitch: if you look like you’re going to run out pass to a team mate to keep the ball moving and in the field of play.
One last reminder:
Match days will continue to be cold (and in all likelihood colder), so please make sure your child is not only dressed warmly for the games, but also before and afterwards as well as during them when off as a sub!
Man of the match: Victor Tocca for his two tries.
Runner up: Charlie Read for his tireless support running
Match Report Stowmarket 20/11/11
Leopards
On what started out a cold and very foggy morning, the Leopards took no time to warm up with very clear heads to record the first of three undefeated games. Excellent tagging throughout the team was matched by even better passing from Man of the Match Seth Midwood, which saw the Leopards recording a 5-3 win against Stowmarket A. A pulsating second match with Stowmarket B saw the lead switching twice before superb interplay between Kajeai and Sebastian and saw Victor running in an outstanding team try to square the game. The Leopards rounded off a highly convincing day’s rugby with a thoroughly deserved 4-0 win over debutants Harwich, with the pick of the tries coming after a fast and furious attacking move involving no less than six passes before Seth Midwood grounded the ball over the try-line. Well done everybody for an excellent team display!
Player of the day Seth Midwood
Runner up Fred Hudson
Cheetahs
After a couple of recent game cancellations the Cheetahs came on to a somewhat misty field full of excitement and hunger, and were very much rewarded for their efforts. A very good performance with some fantastic tries saw them beat Stowmarket 2nds 5-2. The second game saw them up against a Stowmarket 1st team, that had previously beat them convincingly at the Woodbridge Festival. The Cheetahs took the lead with some great link up play between Sam Wright and Sam Hyatt and some great runs from Robert Darell-Brown, but Stowmarket came back into it after a few disappointing missed tags. A late surge saw the Cheetahs come through 4-3. Although some of the basics still need work on they should all feel very proud.
Player of the day Sam Hyatt
Runner up Robert Darell-Brown
A special mention for Kurtis Harrington who kept going despite taking a bad knock to the head early on.
Woodbridge Development Festival October 9th 2011
On Sunday 9th October the U7 Cheetahs represented IRFC at the Woodbridge RFC Development festival. The day started off a bit wet but this allowed the pitches to soften. We had mixed results. The side improved through the day and as this was the first festival for all team members we can be very satisfied with their efforts. We played four matches winning one and losing three, however the results improved with each game. On attack we made a few simple errors that would have increased the number of tries scored, however on defence we tagged very well, which bodes well for future matches. The player of the day was Louis Mayall and runner up was Finlay Peartree.