Worcester Under 18 girls staged the final group fixture of the National Cup in the Midlands U18 girls – Pool 2. The 2 previous fixtures had both gone Worcester’s way, with 105 points scored, and only 5 conceded, 2 wins, with 2 bonus points. However, they were up against the other also undefeated team in the pool……..Cheltenham North U18 girls, who had scored 73 points and also only conceded 5. They were also 2 wins, with 2 bonus points. The 2 teams had played each other once already this season and that was a close fought 15-12 win for Worcester.
Yet again the weather conditions on Sunday were far from ideal. The parents drive to Worcester was met with severe down pours of rain, surface water turning the motorway network into swimming pools, and then once at the ground it stopped the girls having a grandstand finish on pitch 1 due to the ponds that had appeared around the pitch from the rain. Luckily we still had pitches available and the match was moved to pitch 3 as it was still playable.
Thankfully just prior to kick off the weather gods arrived and the game was mainly played in sunny conditions.
Preparation for the game had been thrown into disarray during the week too due to the weather and standing water being on the training pitch, which prevented any Wednesday training…..Instead the girls were asked to arrive earlier than normal to put some much needed training and team runs together.
The game started at a good pace and it was clear from the off that it was going to be a forward’s game due to the wet conditions.
The Worcester girls got into the swing of things and were working as a unit well from the off. The coaches had set a squad up for today to last the full 70 minutes with a very strong bench, but the bench was needed early on due to injuries being sustained.
However the change of players didn’t affect the girls and they hit first through the forwards. Having been switched on from the start this was just the pressure release needed and it got the girls working more together.
It wasn’t long before Worcester struck again. After some phases of play a clever cross field kick was made, and it resulted in try number 2 for Worcester.
Worcester were putting pressure on Cheltenham North with some kicks in behind the Cheltenham North defence and some brilliant line speed from the Worcester girls putting Cheltenham on the back foot.
It wasn’t long before the backs got bored of the forwards scoring themselves. Half time score was 22-0 to Worcester.
The second half was a closer fought contest and had Worcester not been working as a team for the whole of the match their heads could have gone down as Cheltenham North struck first after half time, however Worcester kept working at it and eventually the forwards got themselves another try, and the last of the game. A 29-5 win results in Worcester topping the group with 3 wins out of 3. Credit must be given Cheltenham North who never gave up fighting for the whole 70 minutes.
We now have a wait to see who we are drawn again after Christmas.
Well done girls you are brilliant.
