And we're back!!

Week 1 is always interesting as a coach; who will turn up? Will anyone turn up? Will they remember what do to? Will I remember what to do?!

Thankfully, as usual, loads of kids turned up, the coaches were still keen and the weather was glorious. You really can't ask for a better start to the season!

It was great to see how well the kids settled back in after the summer off; lots of great passing, teamwork, support etc. All good!

We have a few new rules this year;

The most noticeable is the pitch has gone from 10m X 22m to 22m X 40m - that's 4x the surface area!

6-a-side on the pitch with up to 5 subs (same free substitutions applies).

10mins each way instead of 5mins.

Offside - we'd already started on this last season as this could be the trickiest.

7 Tag turnover - so the ball goes to the opposition when the 7th Tag is taken.

Try scoring - we are allowed to go off our feet to score this season. We'll be coaching the kids to stay on their feet as diving in to score generally encourages the defence to dive on top!

And that's about that.

So, back to Week 1. Great to see so many familiar faces back, but really nice to see some new faces getting stuck in and enjoying themselves.

The first few weeks will see the kids familiarising themselves with rugby, while the coaches gauge which areas need working on first. We'll then start pushing skills and techniques accordingly over the weeks.

Having said that, they all looked pretty familiar, even our newbies! At the end of the session, it was quite tricky to pick our first trophy winners of the season as so many had done so well.

Nehe Milner-Scarey - donated by Steve Carey (hence the Scarey bit) and looking like an awesome All Black winger (hence the Hehe Milner- bit).
Awarded for great running and effort, it was really nice to see Scarey go to a player in their first week of rugby. Having got stuck in straightaway, listened and played really - and scoring a try and taking Tags, this week's unanimous Scarey winner was Verity.
Well done, Verity!!

Trophy.
Awarded for great play, effort, attitude - and all those things we value in rugby.
This causes great debate as so many did so well. But, we can have only winner, so after further conflab, this week's trophy winner was Harry.
Well done, Harry!!