Warriors Suffer the penalty!

Welwyn Warriors took two teams, U14 & U17 to the Beckenham Rugby Festival on Sunday and finished runners up in both age groups.

Welwyn's U14 re-built team demonstrated further evidence of their progress by finishing runners-up in the Beckenham Festival. En route to the final they beat Petersfield and Havant 7-0, thanks to a converted try by debutant Sam Voyle, then beat Heathland 26-0 with tries from Milly Porter twice, another from Sam Voyle and one from Welwyn player of the Tournament Courtney Arberry. In the final Welwyn met National Champions Cramberleigh, who proved too experienced and lost 26-7, but were unlucky only to score one converted try from Milly Porter.

The U17s were the team of the tournament. They didn't conceed a try all day and amassed 112 points en route to the final beating Havant 36-0, Letchworth 20-0 and Burgess Hill 56-0 in the semi final. In the final they met a combined Petersfield/Camberley side and had them reeling, and looking like they were on rubber legs for the last 5 minutes but couldn't turn the pressure into points and lost out in a penalty shoot out 3-0. The Camberley coach, Gareth Beynon, was generous in his praise of Warriors, confessing that his team had 'Been totally outplayed'. Warriors Manager Dave Marques wasn't too disappointed, 'clearly girls rugby has two tiers of ability and Warriors today showed, at both age groups, that we are in the top tier.

The match against Petersfield/Camberley was a cracker. Our girls were the better side. This is the level we need to play at and we'll be looking to arrange fixtures with more teams like Camberley as soon as we can. To be runners up is a positive step and we intend to build on this, learn from it and use it to our advantage. Far more positives than negatives from the day'!

Warriors at Beckenham Warriors at Beckenham Warriors at Beckenham Warriors at Beckenham