Crawley Festival

Buoyed by a strong showing at Cranleigh last week Horsham set about this festival with gusto. Drawn in a favorable group with Crowborough Whites, Crawley Reds and Eastbourne A progression to the Gold league was certainly within the capabilities of the team if they applied themselves in the way we know they can.

First match was against Crowborough, not a team we come up against regularly and the boys produced some of the best rugby I've seen them play. A resounding win on the back of total dominance of the contact area was the perfect start. 5-0 with trys from Max, Toby, Nicko x 2 and Harvey.

Next up was Eastbourne A and another strong performance ending 2-0 with another couple of trys for Kai.

Crawely followed in what was to be the game to decide the group winner. Horsham conceded their first points but trys from Dan Brand and a fantastic team effort which saw Toby Elliot hit the line straight and with pace creating the space for Harvey to finish a fantastic team try.

So through to the Gold league and first up was Chichester after a long break. Sadly it took Horsham to be 2-0 down before they found the belief that they could win. Trys from Nick and Kai which were both fantastic solo efforts saw the game balanced at 2-2. However a tired Horsham were just starting to fall off the tackles and lost a hard fought encounter 3-2.

Normally 3/4 playoffs don't have much appeal but Horsham vs Haywards Heath is always one neither team wants to lose. Facing what looked like a HH B team we were confident that we could win this one. 2-0 was the final score which I was so pleased about I didn't take a note of who scored!

All in all a great day out, 11 scored and only 3 conceded. What was even better was that we saw flashes of what these talented boys are capable of. I'm looking forward to working hard with them over the coming months and I'm certain we will get over the line in one of these festivals soon.

A massive thanks to Andrew for his refereeing today, Gustov for stepping up to help as we were decimated by last minute injuries and illness and all the parents for giving up their Sunday to stand in a field in Crawley!

Rob Clegg

Full Team
Kai (My man of steel - awesome effort levels)
George
Dan H
Dan B
Nicko
Gustov
Harvey
Nathaniel
Toby
Max