Youth Rugby Match Report | U14s v Caithness 3-3-19

4/3/2019

Orkney Under 14’s - Home to Caithness Sunday 3rd March 2019

Squad for Game:

Ryan Linklater, Declan MacLeod, Travis Davis, Euan Knox, Aiden Cooper, Euan Harcus, Isaac Deerness, Christy McLeod, Alistair Park, Oscar Payne, Alex Scarth, Lewis Kennan, Angus Brown, Kadyn Harcus, Scott Craigie, Thorfinn Sinclair, Harvey Slater and Alfie Reid

Caithness brought across 7 Under 14’s so with Orkney U 14’s having a squad of 18 it was agreed to have a 12 a-side development match played across 3 periods of 20 minutes with the score not being formally recorded.

With the rain relenting after the warm up the game was played in blustery but dry conditions.

For the first 20 minutes Travis, Euan Knox, Alex, Ryan and Alex played for Caithness and Orkney played into the wind.

The first 20 minutes was an even contest with tries being scored by both sides. Orkney played some good attacking rugby with Oscar to the fore well supporting by Euan Harcus, Oscar scored two tries in this period with Euan scoring one. In the Caithness side, their player wearing the Nos 1 jersey was running strongly and profited with some weak tackling from the Orkney side resulting in 3 tries from him. Within their backs Travis was running the show and scored one himself which would have given Caithness a lead if this was a scoring match.

For the 2nd 20 minute period, Kadyn, Angus, Lewis, Thorfinn, and Alistair went across to Caithness.

Travis ran the backs well creating space and picking up a hat trick of tries. Declan, Ryan, Christy and Alfie put in some good tackles. Isaac, Aiden and Oscar claimed well taken tries. The try of this period came from a quickly taken penalty deep within the Orkney 22 from which Travis tapped to himself, advanced and then kicked ahead outrunning most of the Caithness defence. As he scooped the ball off the ground near the Caithness 22 a covering tackler managed to tackle him. Travis however managed to offload well to Euan Harcus who had supported well. Euan was tackled by the Caithness defence scrambling back but stayed on his feet long enough to off load to Euan Knox who ran past the remaining two defenders and run in close to the posts. A try created by the excellent vision and running of Travis combined with both Euans not giving up and supporting strongly. In this period Caithness managed two tries.

In the last period Harvey, Scott, Christy, Aiden and Declan went to play for Caithness.

The last period saw a return to the even content of the first 20 minutes. Orkney scored four tries in this period by Isaac, Oscar, Alex and Travis with the Caithness Nos 1 scoring twice for them. This period saw better tackling from Orkney with Kadyn bringing down the Caithness Nos 1 and some good tackles from both Euan’s, Thorfinn, Ryan. Declan and Christy put some good tackles in on their former team mates as they played in the Caithness colours. Of the four tries the best in this period started on Orkney’s own 10 metre line and Travis stole the ball in the tackle and the ball was worked out by Euan Knox to Ryan who advanced well and offloaded to Euan Harcus who evaded some of the Caithness defence and played in Alex for a well worked team try.

A good performance especially later in the game with some areas to work on for the Orkney team going forward. The coaches were especially pleased with the effort given by the players when they played for Caithness.

R.K.