York Victorious
AFTER OVER 1000 hours of sport over four days in 107 different events, the University of York triumphed over their Lancaster rivals to re-claim the Carter- James trophy by an emphatic 40-point victory.
The weekend followed a pattern similar to that of recent years, with the home team leading convincingly throughout. York took an early lead in the Equestrian on Thursday and from that point on were ahead in the scoring throughout. The hosts rarely looked pressurised in their pursuit of victory, with a short blip on Saturday afternoon being the only moment when the result looked in question.
Although such a comfortable scoreline looked unlikely at the beginning of Sunday, and was probably slightly unfair on the visitors, it wasmade attainable by an inspirational performance from York throughout.
On Friday, York was faced with potentially close encounters across the board, but the home team seemed in no mood to take prisoners as they laid siege to Lancaster on several fronts including the Cricket, Badminton and Skiing.
However, the most resounding victory of the day came from the Squash Club who won in the Women’s, Men’s and Mixed 1sts in straight sets, 5-0, 5-0, 5-0, embarrassing their Lancaster counterparts. Elsewhere York were finding other fixtures similarly comfortable, as they dominated the Badminton tournament with the Mixed team winning 8-1, inspired by the performances of Jonty Hiley, and Sarah Myers.
The Rugby Seven’s tournament proved to be the only blip on an otherwise perfect day, as Lancaster’s powerful backlines and skilful attack proved too much for the York teams. However, end of day victories in the Swimming and Cricket overshadowed the disappointment and provided York with a monumental 30-point lead at the end of the first day. Day two proved to be a much tighter contest, and the most frantic. An early start saw fixtures in the Canoeing, Trampolining and Hockey being split between the teams. AU President Tom Moore led his side to victory in the Indoor Football Men’s 2nds with a domineering hattrick.
A nervous afternoon lay ahead for the home team however as Lancaster produced a string of excellent performances in the Tennis, Ballroom Dancing, and Table Tennis. This was followed by a catastrophic performance by the York Women’s 1sts in the Rugby Union as they were defeated by 47 points to nil. Suddenly the Lancastrian crowd were spurred on by their teams’ performances, and you could sense the nerves across campus as news filtered through that Lancaster had closed the gap to a meagre point.
The comeback was not to last though, as York recovered wilfully with an important victory in an exciting and tense hockeyMen’s 1sts game, won eventually by York 2-0. From that pivotal moment, York clawed their lead back and found themselves 20 points ahead at the end of the second- day, requiring less than 30 points to reclaim the Carter-James trophy.
Entering the final day as the underdogs, Lancaster went into the early-morning rowing regatta requiring a big victory. A promising start from the away team Men’s Fours lead to a short period of anxiety, but class prevailed as the Women’s rowing team provided a sterling performance, winning all of their races and all but confirming York’s 11th consecutive victory as the home team. Things went from bad to worse for Lancaster as they were heavily defeated in the Archery and lost surprisingly to a sprightly football
Men’s 2nds 1-0.
Unfortunately the edge was taken off a second day of powerful displays by defeats in the Rugby Union and Football Men’s 1sts, but it was not to ruin the York party, and by mid-afternoon they were confirmed victors of Roses 2007. Speaking after the presentation ceremony, York AU President Tom Moore declared the victory as a “convincing” one and a “very proud moment” for himself. He added: “Ever since I got the position [of President] a year ago this has been one of my main aims.” Talking about the weekend as a whole he said: “A lot of the fixtures were awfully close but if we’d carried our form from Friday into the two following days we could have been 80, or even 100 points in front.”
He singled out the Squash Club for providing the most impressive performance of the weekend and added that he thought the pivotal performance came in the Rowing Regatta on Sunday. Moore concluded with a special tribute to a beleaguered Rugby team who conceded the most points of any club to the opposition. “I’m very impressed by the rugby guys, even though they didn’t get too many points I’m proud of them. They deserved a lot better than what they got”.
Lancaster AU President Dave Greenshields was in a sombre mood afterwards stating he was “proud” of his team despite an eventual heavy defeat and agreed that the Rowing Regatta proved the “turning point” in the weekend, adding “I think we lost this on Friday to be honest”.
