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U14s win Hymers Sevens Rugby Tournament
Report by Liam Hopkins in Year 9:
Merchant Taylors u14 Sevens Squad, won the Hymers Sevens Tournament on Wednesday 11th March, in Hull. The team arrived, after a long bus journey, and were major underdogs to win the tournament. How wrong everybody was!
The first game Merchants played, was against Mount St. Mary's, a tightly contested affair. Merchants went up after an early try, but conceded before half time, leaving the scores at 15-5 at the break. Merchants came out in the second half, all guns firing, and scored another two tries to level the scores at 15-15. The opposition once again took the lead 22-15. With two minutes to go, Merchants put another past Mount, but still needed a conversion. Curtis Bell converted, from a very difficult kick from a wide position, leveling the scores at 22-22.
After scraping through with a point from their first game, up next was Bradford Grammar School, who were defeated in their opening game. Merchants found the going easy and played well, running out eventual winners 36-7. A comfortable victory for the Merchants team. However the next game was against Ashville, who had won their first two matches comfortably.
Merchants went two tries down early on in the game, but showing awesome spirited to fight back to within 7 points. Unfortunately, there was little time left for Merchants to equalize, and eventually they lost the game 24-17. This now left them with a bit job to do in the final group game, again St. Peters of York, who looked a very strong side.
Merchants seemed to have been intimidated in the first five minutes, conceding two avoidable tries from some silly mistakes. Just before half time, they scored to pull themselves back into contention. The second half started with many attacked from Merchants, who inevitably scored. At 14-14, Merchants once again broke through the defense to score. Then another went past St. Peters to put the game beyond their reach. The final score was 26-14, and meant that Merchants had finished second in the group and were through to the semi-finals. They had exceeded everybody's expectations.
The draw left Merchants to play the team that had finished top of the other group, which was Woodhouse Grove, who had won every match in their group. The boys started brilliantly and before they knew it Matthew Gilchrist had a hat-trick. A further two tries saw Merchants eventually win the game by five tries to Grove's two. The underdogs were through to the final.
This set up a rematch between Merchant Taylors and Ashville Grove. The game started at a furious pace, and it wasn't long before the first try was scored. It went to Merchants, through Ollie Noble, who scored from an intercepted pass. The game swung both ways, with Ashville scoring to equalize, then they went ahead but, once again, Merchants pulled back to level the scoring. At the end of normal time, the scores were tied at 17-17. The referee called for a ‘golden try' situation, meaning the next score wins. Ashville won the toss, and bizarrely chose to receive from the kick off, meaning Merchants could put them under early pressure and could force a turn-over ball, which is exactly what happened. The kick came in from Ethan Allen looking for the winger Liam Hopkins, who was unmarked, but it rebounded off the opposition and fell for Alex Roberts who scored the try to secure the trophy.
Merchant Taylors, the team all the way from Liverpool, that nobody had ever heard of, had defeated all Yorkshire had to offer, coming away which their first piece of silverware this season.
MTBS U14 Rugby Team