DURSLEY DERBY

The sun was shining on the kids all day at Dursley Festival last Sunday.
The Stroud Cobras and Vipers turned out in force with 25 players (one poorly).
Each squad had 6 matches ahead of them, running to a strict timetable.

The event kicked off with the First match for the Vipers against Painwick. This was a comfortable win at 6-3 and a great way to start the festival.

The second match for the Vipers saw a complete change of team and they ran in 6 tries against Hucclecote Gladiators' 5.

Straight after the Hucclecote match was Cirencester Flames who put up a fantastic defense and with extremely fast running managed to get 5 tries past the Vipers, 4.
At this point in the afternoon Stroud Vipers and Cirencester Flames were neck and neck on points - only a difference in tries.

The next match was very important to Stroud as it was against the Minch Tups. As Minch had beaten us in the final last year there was added pressure to beat them. AND WE DID!! The final score was 6 -5 to Stroud. My apologies for the pitch invasion by the mums at the end of the match but a well deserved win.

The afternoon continued with Malvern vs Vipers in a 4-4 draw and the final match against Dursley Dragons ended in a sad loss at 3 - 0 to Dursley.

Dursley Dragons went into the final from Pool B

The Cobras had a fantastic day with many of the team playing in their first Dursley Festival.
The Cobras had to wait until 10.36 for their first match against Hucclecote Centurians.
Callum T ran in the first try for Stroud but the Hucclecotes defense was impenetrable and they ran over our line 4 times ending in a 4-1 defeat for Stroud.

After a short break the Cobras were back on the pitch against Longlevens. In this match we saw superb tagging and defense and the Vipers finding their feet. The final result was 3-3. When you think that Longlevens went on the win this Pool a draw was an amazing result.

When the Cobras went up against the Minch Rams the quicker and more experienced Minch ran in 3 tries against Stroud. Stroud fought back well and achieved a cracking try at the end of the match.

The Vipers afternoon continued well with the next match against Thornbury ending in a draw at 3-3.

Cirencester Phoenixes came next and another draw at 2-2. With the kids coming into their own the defense and tagging were awesome.

The final match for the Vipers was against the Dursley Panthers and unfortunately I never wrote down the final score (apologies!)

The winner of Pool A was Longlevens.

Longlevens were the overall winner of the 2013 U'8's Dursley Festival

The award for Best Try of the Day went to Theo Van Meter for a full length pitch sprint and try.
The award for Best Defense went to Imogen Latham who astounded all the coaches with her ability to remove tags like no one we've ever seen before - a force to be reckoned with!

Each and every child played to the best of their abilities on Sunday and made the Stroud coaching team very proud of their achievements.
A fantastic day was had by all and every child came away with a medal.