U9’s Host Tupton & Mellish

The teams arrived and the under 9’s preformed their morning ritual of kicking the ball up and down the pitch, with varying levels of success.
The rain slowed to a stop. Ben, Garvin and Andy started warming up the three squads, playing their tried and trusted games, at one point nearly the entire team were planking!

Tupton and Mellish started to arrive and it was time for the Panthers first game of the season, expectations for their first match were high.
A discussion amongst the parents on the financial remuneration on try scoring which ranged from 50p to £1:50 at this point a certain head coach “Ben” suggested that a pay-out per pass would be a great idea. Is he dropping hints that the kids don’t pass the ball?

Tupton,unfortunately, could only muster half a team so a Tupton/ Panthers hybrid was fielded for the first game.

The first set of games the Panthers looked a bit hesitant and a tad cautious, but quickly the training took over and the tackling and taking a tackle was swiftly improving.

By the second game everything was coming together (even the sun had come out to watch). Although forming a line was a bit too much at times, which Garvin may have pointed out a few times, and never got to shout “forwards” even once!

For the first match, this spectator enjoyed watching the action. Although all the kids performed well, Khi and the unstoppable William did make me smile.

Thoughts from the trenches:
Ben: Good solid involvement from all the players. The Panthers have done well, and I was thoroughly impressed.
Garvin: Impressed, the players improved as the games went on.
Richard: Good use of the width of the pitch, Overall a good performance.
Andy: Very good use of space especially after restarts. As work in progress goes, very impressed.
Dave: I’m too old to keep up with this lot.

And special thanks to Ella as my backup photographer, although two of the photographs Ben and myself were just scary .

Because of the high standard of play, there was no player of the match.

To the people who make this possible and fun Ben, Garvin, Andy, Richard, and Dave. With thanks to Tupton/Mellish for a very watchable first match of the season.

Yours Cookie (Roving Match Reporter, U9’s) + proof-reading By Rachel

A quick thanks to Tupton and Mellish for providing the competition, some solid play all-round with a great attitude shown by all. Thanks also to Cookie for the photos as well as his first instalment of the season.

Given this was our first game of the season I was really impressed by the intent shown by our whole squad. Numerous areas to work on from a technical aspect, but everyone got stuck in which was great to see. From the brief bits of the games I caught I saw some really good running and support work, some nice offloading (before, during and after the tackle) and even one or two people communicating a little more (special mention to Felix D in this regard, great first outing for the club). The tackle is obviously an area we will continue to work on, with some more successful than others, but it was encouraging to see that even when players struggled a little on one occasion it did not stop them from trying again, great to see.

Looking forward to the games in three weeks time against Matlock.

Ben