Datchworth Under 12’s attended OA’s Festival of Rugby today, and enjoyed wonderful weather yet again, as well as excellent playing surfaces and facilities at the OA’s main grounds at the Woollam Playing Fields. It was a great opportunity to give our lads a warm up before next week’s festival at Letchworth, and to allow the whole squad to have a run out and in particular introduce the new lads to the team and what it means to play for Datchworth.

We were placed in a pool with Hemel Hempstead and Watford, the latter of which we had not played before. First up though was Hemel, and it was a close match with some lovely flowing rugby on show from both sides. There were some big hits going in, not least of which from our new recruit Sam Whitby who made some huge tackles on some big lads, as well as from our old stalwarts like Josh Staddon and William Field, both of whom were also able to claim a try a piece. A third from Matthew Rates made the result a 15-10 win to Datchworth.

Next up was Watford, and having watched them in the previous game we could see they had some big units who caused Hemel a lot of trouble. On the whole we were able to contain them though, and once again William Field took a try along with Josh Staddon, and Sam Whitby’s powerful running earned him two tries in the match. Watford got a try in each half, meaning another Win for Datchworth 20-10.

As Pool winners, we were then placed against the winners of the other pool which was Amersham, another team we had not come across before on our travels. It was a closely fought, well played match, with long spells of hard play in both defence and attack, but yet again we came away on top with a try apiece from William Field and Joshua Staddon to take the win 10-0.

Well done to ALL players in the squad today – maximum effort was given by all players so it’s difficult to name everyone, but it proved a great opening to our season. The passing game was well played today in particular, as was the level and commitment of tackling, but there is work for us to do in the breakdown area to ensure we protect our ball quickly and securely, as well as to steal opposition ball where we can. For day 1 of our match playing season it was an exceptional result though.