City Lions U7's just miss out in Cup -Final

Sunday October 16th 2011

Durham County U7’s TAG Tournament @ Sunderland RFC

Ashbrooke

City entered two enthusiastic squads in the Durham County U7’s TAG Tournament held at Sunderland RFC on October 16th, with the squads called Durham City "Tigers" and Durham City "Lions". Emphasis was on player inclusion and all players getting equal game time. The competition comprised three groups of four teams playing "round robins" against each other, with the top four teams going into the "cup" semis and another 4 teams going into the "plate" semis. Below are the results from what was a very enjoyable day. Many thanks to all parents and supporters who were fantastic throughout the day! Lets hope the good weather continues long into the winter months.

Durham City Tigers

Durham City Tigers 40 – 40 Hartlepool
The first group game for the Tigers was a closely battled encounter that could have gone either way and resulted in a draw.

Durham City Tigers 30 - 40 Westoe "B"
City Tigers fell behind fairly early in this game against a very strong Westoe team. Despite strong running and determined tagging we couldn't quite get ahead and narrowly lost by six tries to eight.

Durham City Tigers 30 - 20 Bishop Auckland "A"
Building on the strong performances in the first two games, the players were determined to get a win under their belt and forged ahead early in this game with some excellent attacking rugby and support play. Bishop came back strongly at the end with a couple of late tries, but the City players had done enough to hold onto a deserved win.

Durham City Tigers 30 - 50 Westoe "A" - Plate Semi Final
The above results meant the City Tigers were through to the knock out phase in the plate semi-final and the players started to get excited at the thought of medals and trophies! All the City Tigers played their hearts out and were unfortunate not to score more tries with final passes getting intercepted on two or three occasions, which proved to be the difference between the two teams and unfortunately we didn't quite make it through to the final.

During the course of the day all the players managed to score tries and were tenacious in defence. While the Tigers squad were unlucky and disappointed not to progress further we accepted defeat graciously and stayed on to "roar" on our team mates, the Durham City Lions.

Durham City Tigers Squad: William Ashforth, Ethan Dobson, Mark Dyer, Harrison Girot, Bradley Jobling, Joseph Taylor

Durham City Lions

Durham City Lions 40 - 45 Bishop Auckland "B"
The City Lions started a little shell shocked with Bishop leading the scores but a good effort tagging and scoring left the result in the balance with Bishop winning marginally.

Durham City Lions 40- 30 Westoe "A"
The boys were quick of the mark building from their strong finish from the last game and built a comfortable lead. An all round good performance with lots of running and support play led to all of the players wanting to score tries.

Durham City Lions 50 - 40 Darlington Mowden Park "B"
A good performance with plenty of tagging and scoring of tries resulted in our second victory.

Durham City Lions 50 - 40 Darlington Mowden Park "A" - Cup Semi-Final
These results took us through to the cup with a semi final against Mowden "A". The City Lions squad knew this game would be evenly balanced due to the friendly we had played a few weeks ago. Mowden started strongly and the City Lions fell behind. Durham City Lions then pulled together and continued to concentrate with the result in the balance, Durham kept the pressure on and were too strong for Mowden in the end.

Durham City Lions 40 – 50 Sunderland Reds - Cup Final
This took us through to the cup final and all the players were really excited at the chance of silverware at their first ever festival. The Lions were playing against one of the host club squads, Sunderland Reds, and the teams were evenly matched, both matching each other score for score. At the end neither team knew who had won with plenty of good rugby being played by all. Unfortunately Sunderland won.

All the boys below scored lots of tries and contributed lots of effort and tags. They all represented DCRFC well and are a credit to the club and their families in the manner they played. WELL DONE

Durham Lions Squad: Terry Hart, Kye Patterson, Sam Mason, Louis Watting, William Dracup