Warrington U8's Retain the Vale Trophy!

The weather was mixed, and the squad was grateful to take shelter from the heavy showers in the deluxe gazebo that was the Under 9’s basecamp.

On arrival we found that the tournament was made up of 2 groups of 7 teams, with the group winners playing in the Cup final, runners up in the Plate.

The squad for the tournament was Adam, Archie, Ben, Charlie B, Jack, Joe, Josh, Michael, Patrick and Stephen.

Warrington 7 – 5 Southport
Tries: Michael 3, Adam, Ben, Jack, Stephen
After getting the camp sorted there was very little time for a proper warm up, and it showed in the first half, as the boys were looking a bit sluggish, and went behind 3 times before drawing level at half time.

A wake up call from the coaches at half time produced the desired results, as the pace of the game was increased with the defence forcing Southport into errors that they didn’t make in the first half. The resulting turnovers were converted into tries, with Michael completing a hat-trick and the first win was in the bag.

Warrington 10 – 4 Waterloo
Tries: Charlie 3, Adam 2, Michael 2, Archie, Ben, Josh
With the rustiness of the first game gone, the boys showed what they could do, with a dominating performance against a Waterloo side who had no answer to the smothering defence of the Warrington side.

With Waterloo contained, the boys put on an attacking show with many tries scored from within their own half off the back of great backing up, and the result looked secure at half time with the score at 5-1.

The second half saw Waterloo stage a fightback, but it too little too late, and the game ended with a resounding Warrington victory, the 10th try completed Charlie’s hat-trick.

Warrington 8 – 1 Sedgley Park
Tries: Michael 3, Charlie 2, Archie, Ben, Jack, Joe
With 2 wins in the bag confidence was growing, and it showed against Sedgley Park. On defence the boys looked like a swarm of angry wasps, and they pressured the Sedgley Park side into many unforced errors as they were pushed back towards their own line on many occasions.

After Charlie opened the scoring, Sedgley levelled, but that was the last time they troubled the scorers as a rampant Warrington side completed a very impressive 8-1 win, with Michael again to the fore with his second hat-trick of the day.

Patrick picked up a slight dead leg in the early in the second half, but fortunately recovered to play in the remaining games.

Warrington 6 – 6 Fylde
Tries: Michael 2, Adam, Ben, Charlie, Joe
With Fylde only having 6 players we played a 6 a side match for the only time during the tournament.

It looked like the game was going Warrington’s way again in the first half, with the defence piling on the pressure and our own possession being converted to lead 4-1 at half time.

Maybe it was changing 4 of the 6 players at half time against the same 6 Fylde players, who were up to match speed that did it, but Warrington produced their worst half of the tournament, and Fylde took advantage to level the match at 6-6. It was a scare, but we remained unbeaten.

Warrington 8 – 2 Vale of Lune
Tries: Michael 3, Adam 2, Ben, Charlie, Josh
After the shock of the Fylde comeback, the squad regrouped, and refocused, with the battle cry of “It’s our Cup - we’re not giving it up” ringing out in the team huddle before they took to the field against the hosts.

Vale were our opponents in last year’s final, so we were prepared for a tough encounter, but the boys hit top form once again and after turning round 4-2 at half time closed the game out with a 2nd half clean sheet, not to mention Michael’s hat-trick of hat-tricks for the tournament.

Warrington 6 – 1 Altrincham Kersal
Tries: Stephen 2, Adam, Ben, Charlie, Michael
The final group game, and the boys treated it as a semi-final, knowing that a win out them in the Cup Final – the result went the way of most of the group games, with a smothering defence blunting all of Kersal’s attacks, and forcing errors.

The tries flowed again, victory was assured and at the final whistle the boys celebrated winning the group.

In the other group our old friends Sefton finished top, with our neighbours Lymm securing the runners up spot.

The Final: Warrington 5 – 4 Sefton
Tries: Archie 2, Adam, Charlie, Michael
Sefton won all of the games in their group, so something had to give.

The match was incredibly tense, and a brace of tries by Archie in the first half edged us ahead, but Vale scored just before the break, so the second half began all square at 3-3.

Tensions were showing in the crowd as the game wore on with nothing between the teams, and some tough calls by the ref forced 2 or 3 penalty turnovers against us, but the players kept their heads and continued to defend like heroes with several goal line stands repelling the Sefton boys. Michael gave us the lead at 5-4 late in the game and a final mighty defensive effort secured the win, and with it the tournament trophy.

Player of the tournament was a really tough call as there were so many candidates (10 of them to be exact), but it was awarded to Charlie for a tremendous all round performance, he led the way in defence and his mazy runs were rewarded with plenty of tries – nice one Charlie!!

Coaches Summary:
Mark A: I thought I’d seen the boys playing at their peak at Rochdale where they were rated by the opposition coaches as they best team they played all year by a long way, but the performances throughout the day surpassed that.

While the same names regularly appear on the scorers list (as they have done all year), all of the players made some great runs creating the opportunities for players backing up to round off the tries, while Josh and Stephen were very effective at clearing our lines with some barnstorming runs.

However, as you may have gathered from the match comments, it was the defensive performance that won the day, with many opponents not being able to get any forward progress on their sets, and that was down to all 10 players (who all played at least half of every match) showing real commitment to stop their line being breached.

Mark M: I thought Sunday's performances were absolutely fantastic. Tagging was brilliant, even better than against Blackburn and Sefton in previous weeks and it set the platform for our attack. It was really good to see the lads out enthuse everyone they came up against and stand their ground several times on our own line.

Our attacking play was top drawer, with excellent breaks and support play complimenting the usual try scoring machines. I was extremely proud of the whole squad, not only with how they played but also with the way they approached the whole day.

Finally, thanks to Martin for being our ref for the tournament, and to the parents for their superb support once again, even if it did almost boil over during the final - no names, but you know who you are!!!!

Well done boys, you’ve done yourselves and the club proud!!