James crowned kings of college rugby once more in Tens
James once again underlined their domination of college rugby by claiming the honours in the annual tens tournament for the third successive year, adding to their 15s tournament triumph earlier in the term. They managed to fend off the spirited challenge of Alcuin in the final, emerging 19-17 victors in a suitably entertaining finale to an outstanding day’s rugby action featuring all eight colleges.
Fatally for Alcuin’s hopes, President Paul Guest, who had been instrumental in organising the tournament but had suffered a suspected fractured ankle in the day’s opening match, skewed a conversion short of the posts when presented with the opportunity to level the final at 19-19 with the game’s last kick. James had established a 19-7 advantage in the second-half, courtesy of tries from Raphael Gindre, Giles Welford and Ben Ivory, but Alcuin refused to surrender and their two late scores had rocked the game.
James President Alex Muntus, who also had a hand in arranging the tournament, said afterwards: “We’re dead chuffed about winning. The guys all played brilliantly! It was great to see all the colleges out and so many on the touchlines. Paul Guest deserves a lot of credit for organising much of the tournament, as does Adam Clark at York Sport. Hopefully this event will breed more enthusiasm for college rugby and I look forward to future tournaments.”
The final mirrored the meeting between the sides during the group stages, where James had let slip a 10-0 lead to allow Alcuin a draw, and was certainly testament to the fighting spirit demonstrated by the team, ably captained by Giles Raymond. However, James were worthy champions, reaching the peak of their abilities in the 52-0 semi-final rout of Derwent, and showed superior standards of skill and organisation throughout, suiting the tens format, which favours patient possession build-up and exploitation of space worked open.
With each of York’s eight colleges assembling teams, the competition’s format was two groups of four with a round robin fixture list. Group winners and runners-up would proceed into the semi-finals, while those finishing in third and fourth places would contest a secondary plate competition. Games consisted of two, ten minute halves. It quickly emerged that officials, supposedly supplied by the University rugby club, would be at a premium and several volunteers from opposing teams were compelled to step into the void.
In Group A, Alcuin wasted little time in sending out a stern warning of their potential, dismantling Goodricke 29-7 despite Guest’s early injury scare. A neat passing move from right to left released Rhys Spong to blitz down the flank to score the tournament’s opening points. Within a minute, he had notched another and additional tries from Bradley Voigt, Tom Rider and Huw Burdge settled the matter. Simultaneously, on the adjacent University seconds’ pitch, Halifax, who had won the recent tri-college competition with Vanbrugh and an amalgamated Goodricke/Langwith, set their stall out by beating Vanbrugh 25-5 and promptly took command of Group B.
Having assessed their chief rivals, James opened their campaign against Langwith with a 29-5 win, gained through the tries of Muntus (twice; the first self-inflicted by Langwith’s rearguard, the second resulting from an intelligent reading of the play), Will Maxwell (twice) and Captain Seb Weir. The opening round of Group A matches set up the day’s most appetising clash, James against Alcuin, nicely. Although Alcuin boasted a visible advantage in physical strength, James made all the early running and Aaron Rolph concluded a move conducted by Gindre’s outside break. After stretching their lead to 10-0 on the stroke of half-time, the ball grounded anonymously under a heap of bodies, James capitulated and their opponents, realising that spreading the play would benefit them more, clawed it back through Ben Howes and Sprong for a deserved share of the spoils.
Over in Group B, Derwent had demolished Wentworth, who were handicapped by only having eight players, but came unstuck in a tight tussle with Halifax. The game was settled by Reed’s superb individual try, as Halifax sealed progression to the knock-out stages with a match to spare. Vanbrugh, who looked very professional in their green Ireland-esque shirts, compounded Wentworth’s all-round misery with a 50-0 trouncing, sparked by Josh Whittingham’s ninety-metre dash in the opening minute. The postgraduates’ reward was a meeting with red-hot Halifax, who could afford to rest key players, notably Hugh Pryce, and still rack up 57 unanswered points. Subsequently, Derwent beat Vanbrugh 15-0 to ensure their place in the semi-finals.
Back in Group A, Langwith had restored confidence in a beating Goodricke 12-10, but were overwhelmed 25-0 against Alcuin, despite the final score being somewhat flattering. James fielded a few reserves in the final game of the pool stages, defeating Goodricke 43-0 to avoid Halifax in the last four. Maxwell and Muntus embarked upon a personal try-scoring battle, both having to be content with two apiece, while YUSU Presidential candidate Tim Ngwena rounded off the scoring. Thus, Derwent would face James, Alcuin would meet Halifax, and the remaining three colleges, after Wentworth scuttled away, would participate in a reconfigured plate tournament.
James achieved the pinnacle of today’s college rugby fare in their 52-0 annihilation of a shell-shocked Derwent, starting as they meant to go on with another try from the irrepressible Maxwell within two minutes. Additional scores from Welford, Muntus, Weir and Gindre constructed a 33-0 half-time advantage, the latter attracting the ire of Dan Taylor and Joe Rankin. Maxwell, arguably the player of the tournament, went over again at the start of the second-half, before Huw Harrow and Muntus, once again, completed the humiliation in this grudge match.
The second semi-final represented the polar opposite, as Alcuin edged out Halifax in an unpredictable, closely-contested contest by 17-13. They left it late to secure passage to the final, however, a cruel blow for Halifax, who led 13-12 with seconds remaining. The prelude to the main event was the plate final, between Langwith and Goodricke, after Vanbrugh had been squeezed out of contention. It was Goodricke who scooped the tableware, winning 12-5, before a brace of tries from Reed powered Halifax to a 19-10 win over Derwent in the third place play-off, all for the sake of calculating college points.
Today’s rugbython offered another example of just how much college sport matters to people here at York. Well-attended, engrossing and played in the best spirit, everyone should be proud of the part they played. The final word must go to James College, deserved winners having played skilful and entertaining rugby throughout.
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A well-written roundup of the day’s events…
Well done to all the teams who played, and especially to James of course!
Just have a few additional details for the report after talking to Paul Guest today:
- the Alcuin try scorers in the final against James were Ross Gehnich, Ben Howes and Bradley Voigt
- each of the team captains were asked to nominate their player of the tournament and the people suggested were Alex Muntus (James), Simon Reed (Halifax), Bradley Voigt and Ross Gehnich (Alcuin) and Thomas Benbow (Langwith)
- Guest Quote about Alcuin’s performance: “I have never been more proud of being Coach of Alcuin. Everything we’ve been working on all season seemed to come together on Saturday (except our drop-kicking). Every single one of our lads put in as much effort as they could, and it showed. They ran themselves completely ragged! I especially enjoyed the matches against Halifax and James. We have never had tougher games than those. Congratulations to James college, the deserved winners of the day. So all in all, immensely impressed and spirited performance from Alcuin, even if nearly half our team ended up in A and E!!”
- Guest Quote about the tournament: “Firstly, a massive thank you to all the colleges for not only putting teams together, but for all having impressive squads. The standard of rugby has never been higher in the one-day rugby tournament. Not only that, I don’t think there has ever been as much enthusiasm, passion and banter as there was yesterday in any college sport. A big Thank you to all the supporters who came down as well, they seemed to thoroughly enjoy themselves and get almost as worked up off the pitch as us players did on the pitch! It was a great day out for everyone and I hope it was a positive promotion for not only just how many people want to get involved in college rugby, but also just how high the standard of college rugby can be!”
Best wishes,
AJS
Alex Muntis gets my vote for player of the tournament. The space that 10′s allows him to show his pace makes him nion impossible to defend against, much more so than in 15′s. From my perspective, he was the reason we got such a dicking from James; a pacey 10 against a much slower but arguably stronger backline.
I thought the tournament was played in relatively good spirit. There were a few altracations but this is all part and parcel of what happens when you being together 8 colleges full of passionate individuals wanting to win and in a way, this is what makes it all enjoyable to play in. So much hard work and training culminating in a day of great weather (if slightly too windy) and rugby play. I would honestly like to see how a team comprising of a culmination Saturday’s talent would fare against the University 1′s or 2′s. It would be tight, to say the least.
If there would be anything I’d do different next year (for whoever organises it), it would be to perhpas have it over 2 days, potentially the Wednesday and then a ‘Finals Saturday’, with the same format, but allowing another group set of games in ‘Round 2′ and a Cup/Plate final. Speaking from personal experience and even someone who trains 2 times a week and plays 80 minutes every Saturday for the York RI, I was completely parched by the end of the day and can still barely move. Splitting it up would allow for recovery time and probably result in an even higher standard of Rugby, as well as prolonging the enjoyment.
I know there are logistical problems with this such as pitches, insurance, availability and referees (of which UYRUFC provided us zero for Saturday), but if these can be overcome, making a week of if would make it even better in 2010!
“I would honestly like to see how a team comprising of a culmination Saturday’s talent would fare against the University 1’s ”
Check BUCS, then have a rethink.
Yeh mate, why not start by providing us with refs. UYRUFC who?
Yeah Annoyed, great chat. If your rugby is as good as that, I think you would struggle against the ladies 2nds.
Also, I didnt realise the purpose of UYRUFC was to provide refs for college rugby. Must have missed that…
I think a college Barbarians team against a Uni 2′s team would be a great game. It has been put off previously, but narrowly lost last year and that being after 1 training session. Let’s hope we can arrange one for pre-Roses? That would be good fun.
It was actually the role of the uni team to provide them, and they didn’t. So you probably did miss it.
Still, that Barbarians game. Uni have been putting it off for a while after the little fisty-cuffs last year, so why don’t we get it re-started?
URYFC: A bunch of self-raters who become even worse Rugby players when they put their ties on and ‘dominate’ Ziggys ‘VIP’ room. Cut the crap. You’re in BUCS 2B league and most good school teams would dominate you.
I agree with you funny. URYFC are distinctly average. The majority of players believe their own hype and act like people that can play the sport… there are obviously some class players, Tom Weir, Bugge, Grant, Jones, but a lot of dead weight!!
It says a lot when an ex-England youth international, who left last year, refused to play for the uni team as they werent that good and not that nice people! the same can be said of many another player!! URYFC should grow up and accept that they really arent that good, not even big fish in a small pond!!
theres a reason so many people play college rugby. you dont have to socialise with a load of idiots who put their ties on and think they can take on the world. i await the day they all get barred from ziggys.
I assume the above two posts are talking about UYRUFC. Didn’t the first team do something like go completely unbeaten all season? Seems like “most good school teams” would have some difficulty doing that in a University league.
Gareth, my school went three years unbeaten playing on the hardest school circuit in the country, so your argument is unfounded?! Also the uni rugby team play in one of the lower league in BUCS so claiming that they are good is a bit unfounded!!
If I were you Gareth I would reduce the ego and start trying to improve the reputation of rugby at york as well as the league position of the club…
Hmm, as always an article on College rugby has lead to a ridiculous slagging match… Whatever people’s opinions on uni rugby (which I think has a bad rep from last year but is making good progress now and deserves people’s support for a good year) this article actually has nothing to do with it. A breakdown in communication leading to the reffing situation was unfortunate, but I think the most important thing about the tournament was its success, and the obvious improvement between this year and last. It would probably be an idea to stop having pointless arguments about the Uni team and talk about what was a great day, or just say nothing at all…
In what way is my argument unfounded? Funnily enough “…”, school and university leagues are entirely different. Your school played against other schools, not Universities. Saying that your school went unbeaten in their hard school league does not mean that they are better than a University team that went unbeaten in a University league, there’s no comparison to be held there whatsoever. Your school may well have been fantastic, but claiming most school teams could do better is…that’s right…Unfounded.
Oh, and I’m fairly sure the team having a fantastic season is improving their league position and reputation. Not quite sure why you feel the need to come onto an article about COLLEGE rugby and anonymously throw insults at the UNIVERSITY team, but then that might just be my ego talking. Oh, and I don’t play for the Uni team, it just seems a bit ridiculous you should throw insults at a team who did the best this season that it is possible to do.
York Sport/ College Rugby didn’t tell UYRUFC about the tournament until the Thursday before the matches, when we already had two away BUCS matches to play!!!
I also played for a good school on a hard curcuit, and to compare school and Uni is ridiculous. York’s facilities are rubbish, training is voluntary, and booze temptations are far higher…
UYRUFC have come on leaps and bounds this year: 1st XV unbeaten, thrashed Lancaster, and named York Sport Team of the Year. We are also in BUCS league 1A now, the highest a major sports team at York competes in, with the likes of Liverpool, Sheffield and Sheffield Hallam 1st XVs (far larger and more sports-centred Unis). The 2nd XV also maintained their promotion from last season, including putting 50 points on YSJ 1st XV. And we now have a 3rd XV who finished in the top half of their table in their inaugural season.
Oh, and the 2nd XV put 50 points on the College Barbarians before Roses. Granted UYRUFC had far more training preparation than the BaBas, but barely any College players would make it into the 2nd XV squad (from last season anyway).
But why fight each other? Surely combine forces to make rugby in general stronger at York???
Xx