Colts

Royston 0 - 38 Shelford

Shelford Colts played a Royston combination side this weekend, in preparation for Shelford’s game against Colchester next week in the Eastern Counties Cup Final. In a game played in great spirit, some good rugby was seen from both teams. Shelford started the scoring off though Richard Hall and was quickly followed by Jon Caller. Then, a brace from Matt Caller and two more from Ben Baxter and Tom McGinty. 4 of the tries were converted by Ben Seymour. Unfortunately Royston did not score although they deserved to.

Under 17’s

Huntingdon U17/Colts 17 Shelford U17 0 

Shelford’s 13 players were unable to overcome Huntingdons's 15 and second half inexperienced replacements. 

Under 16's

Shelford 27 Huntingdon 0

The County Champions Huntingdon were humbled at the Davey Field today. The score line reflects poorly on the Stags contribution - they held the hosts to one breakaway score from fly half Pearce Staples in a tough first half, converted by Ben Wierny. It seemed that Shelford's pack were having an off day as on 25 minutes, 6 scrums on the 5m line were held up by Stags - if only the ball had come out to the backs! The second half was a different affair as Shelford's pack started to play with the backs - combining well to set Cameron Fay free who made 20m before offloading to Rory Stone to score in the corner. Wierny kicked a penalty to make it 15-0 before Staples again broke through the last line, converted by Wierny once more. Man of the Match Thomas Pattison worked tirelessly throughout, harrying the Stags scrum half, marshalling the pack and sniffing out any efforts from the Stags loose forwards with some thumping tackles. Josh Pateman made it 27-0 after excellent work out wide from Ryan Kenny and Thomas Queripel.

Under 15’s

Shelford 34 Ipswich 7

Shelford enjoyed an excellent win over a competitive Ipswich side with an exhibition of free flowing rugby on Sunday. The home side opened the scoring within the first ten minutes with Alex Poirier making a break down the touchline, cleverly kicking the ball over the head of the last defender and catching the ball on the bounce and touching down - a quite spectacular try. Elliott Mepham's conversion was successfully executed. The Shelford pack, although smaller than their opponents, was rucking successfully and winning a number of turnovers. Luke Whale scored a second try with a forceful break from the pack through the away team's defence. The remainder of the first half saw Ipswich coming back into the match fiercely challenging for the ball and in particular winning the ball from Shelford at a number of lineouts. Eventually the pressure paid off as one of the Ipswich wingers ran in for a try which was subsequently converted. A half time lead of 12-7 for Shelford was beginning to look somewhat fragile. In the second half Shelford were able to exert more dominance. The half started off with a crunching tackle from Lewis Cooper on an unfortunate Ipswich player who had called to catch the ball from the kick off. Sam Till scored a try shortly after the break, after some excellent forward play, which was converted by Elliott Mepham. Lewis Cooper then scored a fourth try with a characteristic surge from the pack. Ben Kelk at full back scored with a wonderful solo effort having collected the ball from a loose Ipswich kick, sprinting through the visitors defence at great speed.  Sam Till concluded the try scoring just before the final whistle having taken the ball from suspiciously looking forward pass from Ollie Martin. A thoroughly conclusive victory with some excellent rugby played against competent and battling opponents.

Under 14’s

Shelford under 14’s came a very creditable 2nd in their pool group, and came within a gnat’s whisker of upsetting the form book against eventual winners Harpenden A. Shelford then took on a very physical Barking side in the plate semi-final, but lost to the only try of the game. Barking went on to win the plate against Colchester in the final.

Shelford 10 Woodbridge 0

Shelford started very poorly indeed against Woodbridge, and got bogged down in a mauling game for most of the match, with either team’s ball being ‘held up’ on too many occasions. Our advantage was as usual coming from the rucks then going through hands from depth, and although we only did this twice throughout the whole game it did yield two tries, one for Toby Poirier and one for Nick Webb. A win is a win, but if we continued like this our participation in this tournament would be short lived. A sharp word with the boys afterwards seemed to get  through to them.  

Shelford 35 Braintree 0

After Shelford’s poor start, Braintree were unfortunate to be on the receiving end of some great rugby by the boys. A big Braintree side struggled with Shelford’s pace, and a procession of quick ruck ball and great hands saw Shelford tear through on four occasions before half time. The boys had a seven minute ‘purple patch’ where every pass went to hand, as well as them having great depth in the process. Nick Webb opened the scoring followed by Dan Smith, Alex Flynn and Nick Webb again. Joe Sherrington-Scales slotted all four conversions to see Shelford out of sight at half-time at 28-0. With the game won Shelford eased off in the second half, but another Alex Flynn try and Joe conversion saw us to a convincing 35-0 victory.

Shelford 7 Harpenden A 14

This was a fantastic game of rugby. Shelford were a match for their counterparts throughout this contest, and it was only a last gasp Harpenden try that was the difference. With both teams playing attractive open rugby, it was pretty well end-to-end stuff with both teams attacking space at every opportunity. Harpenden are a very well drilled side, and constantly probed for gaps in our defence, and we were up to it until late in the first half when their big no. 8 took advantage of a mismatch to run though under the posts 7-0. The second half saw Shelford really step up, and with the forwards going forward and creating concern in the Harpenden defence, Nick Webb turned on the gas from centre to pierce through a gap and leave their defence trailing in his wake. Lewis Cracknell converted to leave the game finely balanced at 7-7 with a couple of minutes left. Shelford unfortunately turned the ball over in midfield on their 22 metre line, and Harpenden quickly shipped it to their no. 8 again who ran in with time up on the clock 14-7. A cruel end, but a great game played by both teams.

Shelford 5 Woodford 0

This was a game played in dreadful conditions, against a physical and feisty Woodford team. The game was played in a torrent of a storm, which made handling very difficult indeed. Yet another injury to Sam Perry marred our victory, as he was clobbered accidentally in the back of the head at a ruck and suffered concussion. We wish Sam well in his recovery. Shelford tried to play more of the rugby, but with the ball like a bar of soap it made for a messy game indeed. Half time was 0-0, but in the second half the only real opportunity that fell to either side went to Shelford, and Alex Flynn barged through a couple of defenders for a 5-0 victory.

Plate Semi-final Shelford 0 Barking 5

This was a difficult game against another physical and direct east-end side. Shelford were probably the more skilful of the two sides, but Barking had pace out wide to go with their bulk. Although they weren’t overly creative in their play, they did use their size advantage well and were very quick at the breakdown. 0-0 at half time meant that the second half would almost be ‘sudden death’ as the first try scorers went through in the event of a draw. Unfortunately the first and only score went to Barking, as they rounded a stretched Shelford defence. Shelford came back through a couple of good runs by Nick Webb & Harri Beasley, but couldn’t find the converted try to take us through, and our tournament came to an end. Well done to all the boys involved today, they were a credit to the club. The boys now need to believe in themselves more in the knowledge that they are a good side and can now compete with the best in the area as we did today. When one of the coaches from one of the top sides in the area comes up and tells me ‘you’ve got a good side there’, that tells us a lot in how the boys have progressed and really come on as a squad during the latter end of this season. Let’s keep that going against Stamford next week, who we know are definitely one of those top sides. 

Under 13’s

Shelford A 56 – 0 Huntingdon

The Shelford forwards provided the platform for the backs to run in the tries. By cutting off any ball for the visitors to unleash their own back line it was Shelford that dominated from start to finish. James Gibson opened the scoring in the first few minutes and this was followed by George Knowles slicing his way through the opposing centres to make it 10-0. Any doubts about Shelford’s intent to maintain the opening intensity were immediately answered as Calum Miller caught the restart and swept aside anything in his path to score. Freddie Eggleton added a fourth try before the break to make it 20-0. Huntingdon kept competing but with their tales up Shelford were swarming all over them, attacking from every opportunity. The tries came thick and fast with the backs moving the ball out wide with pace and purpose leading to a second try for Eggleton and Gibson notching up two more for his hat trick. The forwards were not to be out done as James Impey was rewarded with a try of is own, shortly after setting one up for Evy Martin-Smith. The Shelford defense was immense with Rhys Roberts putting in a tremendous number of telling tackles and Huntingdon were forced to live on scraps of possession. Will Jones wrapped up the scoring as he cut right across the pitch from his left wing to score. Three conversions from Knowles completed the scoring.    

Shelford B 63 – 0 Royston

The B’s were determined to go one better than the A’s playing on the adjacent pitch and turned this into a one horse race as they completely controlled proceeding from start to finish. The forwards used all their superior pace to get to the breakdown first and provide the backs with an abundance of ball. The backs reveled in the possession from the moment Frank Omandlewis opened the scoring, with the first of his three tries, in the second minute. Will Laing had a commanding performance in the No.10 jersey notching up a few tries for himself in the process. With a shortage of second rows winger Peter Rees was drafted in to play there and he wondered what all the hype is about, when those forwards talk about the “boilerhouse”, “the engine room” etc – he claimed it was like a stroll in the park and was able to get his hands on the ball much more, which using his wingers pace was able to chalk up a few tries. The tries were coming in from all over the park with Robin Harvey & Jacob Milner also getting on the scoresheet. Billy Quigley, with his bright yellow boots (are they allowed in the front row??) slotted over 4 conversions. The ref blew up for time early as the contest was well and truly over and further tries were of no benefit to anyone.  

Under 12’s

Shelford 19 West Norfolk 14

Under 9’s

Game 1: Shelford A 25 – 5 West Norfolk

Shelford got off to a good start this morning with a win. Kieran Hatter got his first of the morning from a scrum to find the space to go over in the corner. Our second came from Tom Cropper who received a reverse pass from Hatter out of our scrum. This wrong footed the West Norfolk defence and Cropper went over in the corner. The third came from Hatter who made an interception and ran 10 yards to score. Our fourth came at the start of the second half following a lot of Shelford pressure when Ben Frisk got the ball to score in the corner. Tom Whitehead scored our last after another interception to run 20 yards.  

Game 2: Shelford B 5 – 10 West Norfolk

Shelford got off to a good start with a great run from Miles Brown who passed to Whitehead who scored in the corner. West Norfolk pressed Shelford with 2 tries but there were good performances from the team with good tackling from Miles Brown, Tom Shortt and Ryan Lees

Game 3: Shelford A 25 – 10 West Norfolk

Another good performance with our first two tries coming from Hatter following Shelford pressure. Whitehead got the third after an interception on the half way line. Our fourth came from Cropper who got the ball from Hatter to make it over in the corner. The fifth and final try came from Stan Clark after another interception by pressing West Norfolk. Both wins by the A’s were built on team work.