Sunshine 7s 2009
This was our first time visiting the prestigious Sunshine 7s. Unlike most 7s tournaments this was a straight knock out. Winning your first game would put you into the cup, loosing it would put you in the plate. After that if you lost you were out, so you were only guaranteed 2 games.
Out first game was to be against Apaches, a well established invitational team.
First Round Game vs Apaches 7-31 Loss
The first game was always going to be tough, especially as this would be our opening game of the season. We conceded early on, but were then shortly level when Unseld went round the outside of his man to score under the posts. From here onwards though we looked rusty. We didn't do anything majorly wrong, but neither did we do anything majorly right. There was a sequence of dropped balls and turn overs that allowed Apaches to pull away and run out comfortable winners.
Second Round Game Plate vs Fat Boys 71-0 Win
We had to wait about 3 hours for our next game as there seemed to be a few problems with the schedule of games. When we did eventually get on the pitch it was obvious there would be only 1 result. We ran in an easy 11 tried from Adam Daniel 3, Smithy 2, Unseld 2, Purdy, James Catlin, Nikki and Paul Archer.
Quarter Final Game Plate vs Tonbridge Judds 28-14 Win
Tonbridge Juddians 15s side have had a 100% season scoring over 1,000 points on their way to winning London SE 4. Knowing this we knew this would be a tough game. It proved to be tough, though we never looked likely to loose. The defense was very impressive and we were calm with the ball in hand. By half time we were 21-7 up and in control. We scored 1st in the 2nd half giving us a comfortable 21 point lead. At this point Juddians seemed to loose the plot, and their players seemed more interest in tryin to smash into us whether they were attacking or defending and totally lost any 7s skills they had previously shown. The final score was 28-14 and we were into the quarter finals. (Scorers Adam Daniel, Purdy, Nikki, Unseld)
Semi Final Plate vs Kamikaze 31-10 Win
Our semi finals was against our friendly rivals Kamikaze. Having played them twice last year and beating them twice were knew they'd want revenge, but not as much as we wanted to keep our 100% record. We were 3 scores up by half time and Kamikaze looked a little shocked to be honest. We kept the pressure up in the 2nd half scoring first. They then got 1 back before Unseld scored his 2nd of the game to give us a 31-5 lead. The game was over by this point and we took our foot off the pedal slightly allowing them to score once more to make the final score 31-10. We were in the finals and feeling confident.
Plate Final vs Sevenoaks 38-7 Win
The finals was to be against Sevenoaks of London 2 who beaten the host team East Grinstead in the semis. Running out between the cheerleaders to start the final was certainly a new one on us. From the kick off the ball went into touch. Purdy took the resulting lineout and even had time to grin at the camera while doing it. The ball was flung out but the ball was knocked backwards, we had to srcamble back but we kept our compossure even though we were behind our own line. Eventually the ball was worked wide to Unseld who gased his man and went the length of the pitch.
Seveoaks took the kick off cleanly passed the ball wide and went for a gap. Cavalli tackled the man easily, James Catlin ripped the ball from the resulting ruck and popped it straight back to Adam Daniel who ran down the blind side, beat his man for pace and scored under the posts.
Seveokas then had a few attacks, but just couldnt find a way through our defence. Eventually the ball was turned over at a line out, the ball was worked back and forth until Nikki got the ball, showed some great foot work and strngth powering through 2 men to run the length and score. This brough about half time and we were 19-0 up.
The second half didn't start perfectly with us knocking it on from the kick off, Sevenoaks tried to capitalise by spinning the ball quickly out to their pace man who tried to go round the outside of Adam Daniel, but he was easily tackled into touch. From the resulting lineout Purdy once again won the ball easily. The ball was spun about near our own line until James Catlin stepped his man to be clean threw. Obviously realising that as a forward running 100 metres was a bad thing he put a perfect kick up field near the touch line to allow Unseld to show some amazing pace who took the ball at a strecth and ran in under the posts.
From the restart Cavlli put in another perfect kicking dropping it on the 10 metres line. Althought sevenoaks took the ball they were tackled hard and the ball was turned over in the ruck where Archer picked up from the base, ran down the blind side and just about made the distance to score.
Our last try came when sevenoaks threw a long pass whcih James Catlin intercepted. He then fended off about 4 players while casually look for a gap, he eventually off loaded to Adam Daniel who ran round a tired Seveoaks defence to make the score 38-0. To give credit to Sevenoaks they stuck at it and were rewarded with a try with the last play of the game to make the final score 38-7.
This was a perfect start to the season, and by the end of the competition we were playing some great 7s which bodes well for the rest of the season.
See you all at Canterbury