Match details will appear here as team managers send in their reports.

Under 16’s

Shelford 15 Bishop’s Stortford 15

Shelford came through another stern test against a top Herts side for the second weekend running. Some over eager play gave Stortford the edge in the first quarter as they outflanked Shelford defence for a 5-0 lead. Shelford then had an extremely poor 20 minutes with ball in hand. Shelford were guilty of committing too many forwards at the breakdown to win the ball as Stortford continued to be a handful in this area of the game. With options limited, a kick & chase was  turned over by Shelford which resulted in Lewis Green running clear of the chasing pack, with Lewis Cracknell slotting the extras for a 7-5 lead. On the reverse side of this, a poor ‘follow up’ by Shelford from another kick ahead meant that we were disorganised in defence as Stortford responded well. A couple of cover tackles by Shelford looked to have thwarted Stortford’s response, but great support play by Stortford saw them go ahead at 10-7. The backs were in turn able to go through a few phases, and as their confidence grew they scored out wide through Nick Webb hitting the line at pace through a stretched Stortford defence for Shelford to extend their lead to 12-10. Shelford tried to kill the game with a well struck penalty by Lewis Cracknell (15-10), but a fine response by Stortford resulted in a final try for them late on to square the game up with a fair 15-15 draw.

Under 14’s

Chelmsford 17 Shelford 36

This was a hard fought victory over a big tough Chelmsford team. Shelford had the battle scars to show by the final whistle, including losing inspirational skipper Stephen Douglas with a broken ankle after falling awkwardly in a tackle. Best wishes to Stephen for a speedy recovery. The game was made up of three 20 minute periods. The first period was fought out between the top selections of each team and ended scoreless. The Shelford performance betrayed the evidence of too many Saturday night parties and only desperate defence kept the try line intact. In the second period the gaps opened up in the Chelmsford defence and Shelford got on the score sheet. After the scoring had been opened through a barrelling one yard burst from Sam Jones, a scintillating break from full back by James Knoop put Toby Hackett into score. Hackett scored his second try from a perceptive pass by fly half Ivan Karsten. The try was converted by James Knoop. Then a flowing passing move put wing Alex Tully over in the corner. Shelford were cruising. However, a failure to deal with the restart cleanly let the athletic Chelmsford second row in for a score. With two thirds of the game gone it was 22-5 to Shelford. Chelmsford came out fired up for the last period and quickly scored again. With 4 players suffering injuries during the game Shelford were under pressure. Luckily from the restart Chelmsford fumbled the kick, Sam Jones hacked the ball on and fell on the kindly bounce as it bobbled over the line. Although Chelmsford scored again from a close range tap, a Knoop run-in under the posts made the game safe. Final score 36-17 to Shelford.