Junior 7s Results

U13 Winners: Cup - Guildford; Plate - Esher; Shield - Heathfield & Waldron
U14 Winners: Cup - London Irish; Plate - Sutton & Epsom; Shield - Guildford
U15 Winners: Cup - Hove; Plate - Crowborough; Shield - Esher
U16 Winners: Cup - Rosslyn Park; Plate - Hove; Shield - Lewes

Well done to the winners and to the Worthing Junior Section for all their efforts which resulted in a well run and enjoyable festival.

Sussex v Surrey U16s game tonight

A Sussex v Surrey U16s game is taking place tonight. As previously advised Pitch 3 will be unavailable for training on this day.

Pitch 6 will have its normal schedule from 6.15 - 7.45 for the girls and from 7.45 - 9.15 it will be utilised by the Lower Senior XV's (6A) and the U14's (6B). All others who normally train are encouraged to come and watch/support Sussex U16's.

Worthing U16s 39 v Effingham & Leatherhead U16s 12 - Friendly

There are three things of note about Effingham: Lord Howard, who led the English fleet against the Spanish Armada (and you thought it was Sir Francis Drake didn’t you?); General Haig was also born there (or now better known as Geoffrey Palmer sticking two pencils up his nose and putting underpants on his head at Umberto Gorge); and my Great Grandmother used to live there. But now a fourth can be added: The Worthing U16s grew as a team with a development-led side to convincingly win in a seven try rout.

Goose had yet another cracker as captain touching down twice scoring the first points for Worthing in each of the halves. Will grabbed a brace to get him off his duck. Connor swanned in under the posts to score the imaginary bonus point try, (Right, that’s enough waterfowl puns. Ed). Ryan scored his first try of the season to take him closer to the first full house. And Beto, somewhat symbolically, finished off the afternoon’s scoring by catching the ball over the Effingham try line to dot the ball down.

Above all, this game will be remembered for the way in which the team played with heart and conviction from start to finish (albeit being caught napping at the start of the second half when Effingham scored their first try) and demonstrated that there is real strength in depth being developed now. At last we have a real 24 man squad! (This game was started without eight frontline players and another three playing out of position). It was very pleasing indeed from a coaching point of view. And not only is it difficult to pick some golden moments but it’s difficult to find some howlers. The forwards drove on, snapping and clawing ground in the loose, and the backs passed, delayed and ran intelligently with some lovely lines being created. As I say, difficult to pick out anything superb as it was such a great team performance. But just to mention a few of the ‘debutants’: Taylor’s hands. Boy, can he catch on the run. Jack W2 had another great supporting game setting up at least one try. Liam kept going all game and had some nice deft touches. Joe was strong in the tackle and in the scrum. William taking both his chances well, but doing especially well for the second, and SWD kept persevering even under the added pressure of a constantly infringing back row. Well done everybody.

Team: Joe, Swainie, Hilda, Jack L, Liam, Taylor, Jack W2, Goose, SWD, Hywel, Connor, Jacob, Ryan, Will, Beto.

Subs: Ant, Josh, David, Dayle.
Injured/unavailable: Thommo, Jack W1, Barney, Jake, Eliot.
Scorers: Tries – Goose (6, 47), Will (13, 53), Ryan (30), Connor (35), Beto (65), Cons - Jacob x2.

Worthing U16s 3 v Crawley U16s 0

The Christmas lights may have been taken down but that didn’t stop the pitch being lit up by flashing yellow cards or flare ups in this dour and scrappy match. Happy New Year? More like Scrappy New Year. The only thing of note in this game was that the U16s kicked their very first attempt at a penalty goal in their history. And that was what won them the match and four valuable league points.
That said, apart from the constant stop starts of an overly pernickety official, this game was quite tense throughout with two major overspills of testosterone that lead to a total of five yellows. Err... that was about it. No, seriously. Dayle made a great break as acting scrum half, David did a magnificent steal whilst defending the Worthing whitewash, and subsequently won the penalty that enabled Worth to clear, and Thommo captained extremely well in very difficult circumstances. Consigned to the footnotes of history ......

Worthing U16s 38 v Pulborough U16s 5

A delayed kick off led to a pulled hamstring after the boys were kept waiting around but it certainly didn’t delay the scoring. The previous record for this team scoring a try was against Lewes in the league game last season. It was that quick that in this chronologer’s notebook the record showed one minute and forty eight seconds. Not two minutes, but one minute and forty eight seconds – those twelve seconds can make all of the difference. (Please insert your own punch-line here….) However, that record was smashed on Sunday by its previous incumbent Rhys Thompson. Pulborough kicked off with only fourteen men and Worthing knew that they had to exploit their position to the best advantage as quickly as possible.

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Worthing U16s 7 – Hove u16s 15

Hurrah! Or as Lord Percy would say “Hurrah with bells and whistles on!” And that, I think you’ll find is a strange word to use at the opening of a match report in which we lost. There was a quote from Martin Johnson before the NZ match in Saturday’s Telegraph, which I nearly brought up to read to the boys, but I forgot. He said: “Team spir, that’s what wins you games,” said the England manager. “Battling with your mates, pulling for each other, togetherness, that’s what matters. We’re beginning to see that continuity and spirit.” But Hurrah! because the boys have got the team spirit back. They have the foxtrot but not quite the oscar. No pun intended but when they get the ‘it’ back they will indeed have the team spirit that they developed a couple of seasons ago.

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Worthing u16s 0 – Brighton u16s 47

Whereas last week Worthing turned up with ambition and confidence this week they didn’t. And unfortunately they paid the price for poor basic skills and losing in the top three inches before the kick-off. To be fair, the forwards were giving away about four to six inches in height and a stone per man; they were without two first choice props; playing against at least five County players; and playing into a very strong wind for the first half. But apart from that, everything went to plan .....

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Worthing u16s 27 - Bognor U16s 5

The U16s turned up for their opening game of the season with confidence, and were on the scoreboard within the first five minutes after an early penalty gave Worthing an attacking line out ten meters out from Bognor's line. A knock-on in the line-out gave Worthing a scrum and Rhys picked and drove through three tackles to score in the right hand corner. A difficult conversion from Ryan and Worthing lead after five minutes 5-0. But Bognor are undaunted and after a very good re-start they give away a penalty for Worthing to clear before winning a scrum and attacking Worthing again. The defence holds up well and Worthing make an excellent turn over on their own 22. Rhys breaks again and sets Dayle free on the left hand side and after a good run he is bundled into touch on the Bognor 22.

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Worthing U16 win on Tour

Congratulations to U16 who have just returned from their Tour to Edinburgh as winners of the Capitals Cup.
Having unfortunately lost in last weekends Sussex Cup final against Chichester 3 - 16, the Sussex A league winners returned to the winning trail
The two day tournament played at one of Britains oldest rugby clubs, Edinburgh Academical FC , was won by Worthing 17 - 0 against Trentham from Stoke in the final..
Tries in the final came from Harry Short, Adam Fastnedge and Ralph Sinnhuber with one conversion from Barty Pegg.
The only downside to the Tour was an injury to fullback Barnie Lyons, who sustained a badly dislocated right shoulder in the first ten minutes of the first game. We wish him a speedy recovery.

Worthing U16A v East Grinstead U16

East Grinstead conceded game so Worthing win 40 - 0 and win Sussex U16 A League undefeated