Tomorrow afternoon, the boys in green and black kick off their season away from home as they travel to North-East Cornwall to face Bude.
Following the unbeaten 2019/20 season in Devon 1, the boys have been promoted straight back up into the Tribute Cornwall/Devon league for this season, a league that will bring a whole new set of challenges for our players, a lot of whom weren’t part of the senior side the last time we were there in 2018/19. It’s some 19 months since the boys have played any competitive rugby too, so this game will be a challenge that they will be looking forward to and will be relishing the opportunity to give a good impression early on.
Our lads will be following on from three very different pre-season games, experiencing both fast-paced and more physical games, coming away with a full selection of results with a win, loss and a draw. Each game will have brought encouragement as well as some valuable lessons that will have been learnt.
Our hosts, Bude will also be keen for a strong start to the league so it’ll be vital to post some early points in the game against the strong, forwards-driven side.

Speaking after Thursday’s final training session, Head Coach Sam Williams said: “Finally we get back to league rugby after such a long time away. We are heading into this week's game with a new look team that features lots of previous colts, along with Luke Pattison and George Doughty who have recently joined the club and impressed in training.
As a group we have been looking to develop our game both sides of the ball and hope to be able to implement the things we have been working on in attack and defence this weekend.
It's really exciting to be able to give the boys this opportunity to stake a claim for the shirt defending a considerable list of players who are unavailable or injured for this one.
Each week we have been seeing new players come to training and it's really pleasing that Withycombe is now a club that people are interested in joining again.
If Bude are as expected from past experience, a physical and direct team I think this match is the perfect yardstick for us to understand what it will take to compete in the Devon and Cornwall League, and I am hopeful the boys will give an excellent account of themselves.”

Tomorrow’s game kicks off at 3pm from Bencoolen Meadow in Bude. We hope that as many of you as possible can make the journey to cheer on the boys and be that 16th man. If you’re unable to join us, live match updates will be available online at: http://bit.ly/bud-wit

There is also rugby action at Raleigh Park as the Under 16s take on Tor RFC (3:30pm).

For those using a satnav, the postcode for the ground in Bude is: EX23 8QG