Great start for Manchester U12s in the Lancs Cup

First up came Sedgley Park, a team Manchester beat convincingly in the Manchester Festival. Sedgley showed they had been working hard and gave some strong first half resistance. After kicking the ball away twice the Manchester boys quickly re-assessed and keeping the ball in hand worked three tries in the first 10 mins, Ben H dummying, hitting a gap and going in from 15m out, and Charlie with two Charlie specials. In the half time chat the boys talked about taking the ball into contact too much and not using the space or moving the wide ball.

Half time brought eight substitutions, incl the three Under 11s helping out for the day, and the boys got into their stride. They started recycling the ball faster, passing before the contact and making the most of the overlaps they created from keeping their width. The highlight of the 2nd half was a debut try for Cameron Murdock. Good play brought the ball close to the Sedgley line, a quick ruck, and the ball went through 3 pairs of hands out to Ewan. Ewan could have probably scored himself but decided not to risk the contact on the line and unselfishly fed Cameron with a perfectly weighted pass for Cameron to take in his stride and dot the ball down over the line. Other tries came from Frank, Jayden, Ewan, and Harry, all well taken efforts having been put in space after quick ball and simple catch and pass game.

The Manchester defence was very strong and very few missed tackles kept the home side at bay. All the players got involved in the rucks and Manchester controlled the ball very well. Final score was 40-0 after the game had been called a win for Manchester at 30-0.

Broughton Park played the second game of the day versus Leigh. The Manchester boys watched the first half identifying that BP had a couple of dangerous runners. So they decided closing the space was key for the second game. Manchester warmed up by practising blitz defence in a game of touch.

The BP game kicked off and Manchester continued how they had left off in the first game. The boys worked hard to close the space when not in possession and in the first 10 mins didn’t concede a try. The same theme of width, depth and using the space continued and Freddie Hill, playing at first receiver, kept the ball moving, always looking to put players in space to run. The first 10mins saw Manchester score 5 tries through Big James, Luka and Jayden. James’s tries both from strong individual efforts managing to keep hold of the ball, with Luka and Jayden’s tries from team moves with strong finishing.
In the second half some tiredness set in and a couple of handling errors gave BP good field position. They capitalised both times and crashed over the line twice from close range. Manchester continued to play their way and scored three more tries for Jacob, Frank and Paddy. Paddy’s try being the pick as Manchester got close to the try line, and again moved the ball wide for Ewan to set up a 2 on 1, which for the second time in the day he converted with a lovely pass to Paddy on the wing. Final score was 8-2.

Great play by all the team and fantastic commitment in defence by all. Debut game for Luke in only his third week at Manchester and very well played. Will, James Hargreaves, Fozzy and Henry all worked hard especially in defence, with some great tackling, great rucking and generally disrupting the opposition. Billy kept width on the wing and ran the ball back very well from kicks making the team valuable ground. The three U11 lads (Frank, Freddie and Harrison) played very well and fitted in easily. Harrison had a couple of great runs where he found space and offloaded to supporting players. Ben Wallace played scrum half for the whole of both games and unselfishly passed the ball away and gave excellent service to the first receiver. The quick ball from the ruck and scrum created numerous attacking opportunities for his team.

In summary, two games played, 16 tries scored and only 2 conceded. 11 different try scorers showing how well the boys are passing the ball and using the space. Well played everyone and we are up and running in the 2015/16 Lancs Cup.