A day of drizzle and grey skies couldn’t take the shine off a sparkling display of junior rugby league for the Under 9s six a side tournament. Greetland welcomed players from King Cross and Keighley to fight it out for the honour of lifting the Barlow Cup. In all, there were five teams with Greetland Rabbitohs going toe to toe with Keighley Storm to kick proceedings off. A sleepy Rabbitohs side took a while to get to grips with a Storm side that came flying out of the blocks and found themselves behind early on. With short, 15 minute games the Rabbitohs didn’t have time to recover despite great work from Lil and Ellis.

Next up saw Greetland Gorillas pit their wits against King Cross Cougars in an end to end, entertaining encounter. Karl stole the show with a razzamatazz display of dodging, weaving and stepping to bamboozle the Cougars’ defence. As ever, Maddie chipped in with an awesome defensive display, ably backed up by Jacob and Noah. The well-matched sides couldn’t be separated, however, and the points were shared.

Keighley Storm were then back on to face King Cross Bears and again produced a powerful and dominant performance to announce to all that they were going to be a difficult team to stop. The Rabbitohs still hadn’t woken up properly as they were outmuscled by the Cougars despite strong running from Wilf and Lewis and good attacking play from Joe, nipping in with a couple of tries.

The Gorillas now had their chance to see if they could get past the Storm. In a close match, with great performances from Joseph and Jack, the Storm just edged it – ensuring they had won all of their first three games.

The two King Cross teams then went head to head a seemed to relish the opportunity to put some big hits in on their teammates, the Bears just edging it. This was followed by the two Allrounders teams lining up against each other. Similarly, they enjoyed the chance to get some big hits in on their friends. Karl was again outstanding going forward for the Gorillas and with Will producing textbook tackles time and again they were looking difficult to beat. Joe, Lil and Mylo were combining beautifully for the Rabbitohs, however, and Sam and Issy were working hard in defence. There were no bragging rights to hand out though as the game finished in a hard earned draw.

Keighley Storm were in touching distance of the cup as they came up against the Cougars. In another entertaining game they again came out on top meaning they had picked up the points in all of their games. The Gorillas were then edged out by the Bears despite a couple of tries from Maddie and some more great defensive work from Noah. The champagne moment was stolen by WIll Betts who bludgeoned his way through a packed defence to score his first ever try!

The last game of the day saw the Rabbitohs get some more points on the board thanks to a last minute try from Ellis following some strong running from Sam and Lewis.

Fittingly, given the weather, the Storm took home the Barlow Cup. All of the players took home a medal a reminder of a wonderful tournament played in the right spirit, with support and encouragemtn from the friends and families watching.

Maddie was the top try scorer of the tournament with 9 tries, closely followed by Joe with 8. Well done and thank you to all involved in putting on such an amazing event, especially Mark for the immense time and effort put in to make sure all went smoothly.

Try scorers:
Maddie 9
Joe 8
Karl 6
Lil 4
Ellis 2
Noah 2
Wilf 1
Issy 1