U12 Squad News & Reminders
Hi all,
First of all, a massive well done to Sunday’s squad and to Nick, Adam & Steve. From 4 games, to win 1 and draw 2 (including a game against the current Hampshire Cup winners) is a great achievement. The match report is now on the website! Everyone was particularly impressed by the squad’s legendary togetherness & their desire to fight until the final whistle (despite being on their last legs in the final match against Fordingbridge- after back to back games). It sounds like the high quality of the rucking (with quick recycling of the ball in attack) as well as a solid scrum & line out gave us a good platform for the backs. Great stuff everyone :-)
I can’t wait for next season when we’ll be playing on a full- sized pitch with 15 a side for 60 minutes- the pressure applied by the boys in the final stages of a 14 minute game will hopefully result in tries next season, rather than a sense of “if only the match had been 5 minutes longer…”
Training is at Anstey Park for all this Sunday 4th March. Please note that the Under 9s, 10s, 11s and 12s will be warming up together- led by Tom O'Connor. The warm up will last for approximately 30 mins and then all squads will return to training as normal. I'm not quite sure where Tom is planning to do the warm up but we’ll all meet at our usual spot and take it from there.
A few extra points:
- The match shirts that we’ve been using are now in their 3rd season and the boys are growing so fast that we’ll be lucky to get another season from them! We have a couple of options: 1) we can all buy one of the new Alton club shirts (approx. £35-40 each) or 2) try to get sponsorship for the squad - exactly the same shirts, but with sponsor’s logo on front. We could either have a match day batch of 22/23 shirts (which are returned & washed as we do now) or we could try to get a shirt for every registered player (32 this season)? Please let me know your thoughts. Personally, I’d prefer a match shirt for every registered player- as there’ll be plenty of matches next season
- Would you let me know player availabilities (if you haven’t already) for Sunday 11th March (Hampshire tournament), Sun 25th Mar (Land rover cup- rescheduled) and Vectis weekend- Tournament on Sun 29th April- either for the day or for the weekend. Book up ferries (and accommodation at Rookley) now.
- I’m looking into Squad hoodies for Vectis (for players & supporters) with designer David Wall & I’d like an idea of who’d be interested. Cost will be £5-6 per hoody plus printing costs of (approx) £3 with VAT added to the adult (& larger kids) sizes. Should be less than £10 for a child and less than £15 for an adult.
- Finally: remember midweek training is on Wednesday 7pm −8pm under the flood lights at Anstey Park. The boys (& parents!) who came last week had a great time, so why not give it a go? Everyone is very welcome.
Best wishes,
Wendy
