Harrogate Festival match report, Old Rishworthians rugby club Under 16's beat county champions Percy Park to win the Festival

Rishworthians under 15's and under 16's travelled to Harrogate on Saturday to take place in the Super 10s competition. The Under 16's made it third time lucky to win the Harrogate Festival. They were runners up 2 years ago at under 14's level they lost in the Final to the all conquering National Champions Sandal. Last year at under 15's level they missed reaching the finals. Hull Ionians went through as group winners with both sides having equal points Ionians had scored one more try. This was to be their last attempt at this competition. Players unable to compete having sustained injuries from the previous week’s match were Cameron Ramsden and Rogan Costello. Edward Cockroft started the tournament but within the first 2 minutes he suffered an injury to his shoulder and was on the side line for the rest of the tournament.

Under 16's
Game 1 Old Rishworthians 38 – 0 Doncaster
Rishworthians were drawn in Pool A, which meant they played all their matches at the Claro Road ground, home to Harrogate RUFC. The first match was against old rivals Doncaster. This was one of their squads having entered 2 teams in the competition, the other drawn in group B. Rishworthians were on scintillating form as they ran in 6 tries and conceded none. Alex Redfern scored first with Edward Cockroft missing the conversion and then injured his shoulder and had to retire from the Festival. Sam Hoyland was next to score and Luke Flanagan converted. Then Luke Flanagan hit a purple patch running in a hat trick of tries and all converted by Luke. Ben Porritt added the last try but Flanagan missed the conversion.

Game 2 Old Rishworthians 28 – 7 Guisborough
Next match against Guisborough. Rishworthians have never played Guisborough and so were up against an unknown commodity.
The team still made light work of the situation and ran out winners with four converted tries and only conceding one try. Bradley Gorman opened his account and passed his 50 point tally for the season with the first try converted by Flanagan to pass 150 points for the season, then Chris Dyson got in on the act with Flanagan converting. Gorman grabbed his second converted by Flanagan and not to be out done Dyson bagged his second with Flanagan slotting home the conversion.

Game 3 Old Rishworthians 41 – 0 Harrogate
The 3^rd match in the pool was against the host team Harrogate. Rishworthians won the match comfortably and again kept a clean sheet. Dyson opened the scoring with a missed conversion by prop Gilbert Gregory!!( I don't believe it a prop taking pots at goal. I guess Luke was sitting out this game). Hedley Stirk opened his festival account with Dyson converting, Christus Ferneyhough ran in his first try and missed the conversion. Alex Wood then scored his first try of the season with Gorman missing the conversion. Sam Hoyland ran in another try with Wood converting, then Ferneyhough scored his second try and converted it himself. The final try came from Gorman who bagged his third try of the festival but missed his conversion.

Game 4 Old Rishworthians 36 – 5 York
The last match of the pool was against York. Rishworthians had to win to reach the final. We needn’t have worried. They were once more comfortable winners.
Alex Redfern flew in with a brace of tries with Flanagan converting the first and missing the second. Sam Hoyland then grabbed a brace himself with Flanagan missing both conversions. Flanagan then made amends and scored a try and found his range again to convert. The final pool try came from Chris Dyson again converted by Flanagan.

The Final Old Rishworthians 31 – 0 Percy Park
Rishworthians were in the final facing Percy Park from North Shields Tyne & Wear. Percy Park under 16's Northumberland county champions had gone 51 games (3 years) undefeated. Rishworthians knew they had a game on their hands. It took Rishworthians a few minutes to get into their flow but once they did there was no stopping them and they ran out winners, again keeping a clean sheet.
Alex Redfern started the scoring spree with an unconverted try, then Ferneyhough stormed through and Flanagan slotted home the conversion. The Rishworthian scoring machine was now in full flow with Chris Dyson claiming his fifth try converted by Flanagan to reach 50 points for the festival, then up popped Tom Clough to grab his first festival try converted by Flanagan. The final act was completed by Dyson running in his sixth try and a missed conversion by Ben Porritt.

The players had a fabulous day and at the end of their journey they were victorious. Well done to all the boys who played. There were some exceptional solo tries and some strong defending. Rishworthians only allowed 2 tries to get passed them and scored a total of 28 tries. Chris Dyson was the top try scorer with 6, followed by Luke Flanagan 4, Alex Redfern 4, Sam Hoyland 4, Bradley Gorman 3, Christus Ferneyhough 3, Ben Porritt, Hedley Stirk, Tom Clough, Alex Wood 1. Luke Flanagan was the festival leading points scorer with 48 points.

Squad Chris Dyson, Luke Flanagan, Alex Redfern, Sam Hoyland, Bradley Gorman, Christus Ferneyhough, Ben Porritt, Alex Wood, Edward Cockroft,
Hedley Stirk, Tom Clough, Gilbert Dregory, Luke Brocklehurst, Robbie Kitchen, Ben Robinson.

The player of the tournament was a hard one to call with all the team playing magnificently. It was eventually awarded to Ben Porritt for his dogged determined attitude to never give up and not let anyone pass him. Well done Ben and well done to all the boys.

Under 16's Harrogate Festival slideshow
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Harrogate Festival 2007 - Under 16's Group

Rishworthians v Doncaster

Under 15's
The under 15's performed well on Saturday. Unfortunately their experience of the Super 10's game combined with the strength of Harrogate, Sedgley Park and Sheffield resulted in them struggling to make an impact. However they won the first game against Whitby. Next year I'm sure we will be better prepared.
Sedgley Park won the under 15 trophy with West Park runners up.

Under 14's
Sheffield won the under 14's trophy with Harrogate runners up.

Under 13's
Harrogate won the under 14's trophy with Sheffield runners up

.Under 15's Harrogate Festival slideshow
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