On October 15, our Minis travelled to Hoek van Holland to join the Jan van Burg tournament 20st edition. A good event to test our Warriors still early in the season across the 10 Minis teams registered at the event. Our 18 warriors started the day against DIOK, Rotterdam and Waterweg (Hermes-Sparta-Hookers) in the playoffs. A strong group with a well-known opposition, but our Warriors played excellent rugby finishing first of their group after 3 games, scoring 14 tries and giving only 1 away to the opposition.

The collective effort is visible and the support in place behind every ball. The intensity is high but our scrum is well in place and every ruck is contested. No ball is for free, it has to be won and every try occasion is precious and should not be missed. The rain is certainly not helping anyone and while we love to see the ball “moving”, catching in the action under these conditions is very difficult.

Our Warriors are not giving up and finally realized few excellent collective attacks which were just too fast to be stopped by the opposition. Well done Warriors, you get your ticket for the semi-final against our neighbours from Voorburg!

What a semi-final!! Which would certainly stay in everyone’s mind. The tension was at its maximum and after a extremely competitive 15 min and a 1-1, the referee decided to go for the golden try during an extended 2×2 mins extra game. No chance, both teams were extremely solid in defence, giving no space to the opposition to score a last try. Well … guess what, the game can’t continue forever so the referee decided to have both captains to play rock/paper/scissors … first time for all and what an outcome .. our Warriors won, thanks to captain Tyler!

Here we go, time for the final against HRC. All were certainly happy to play the final, no doubt about that, but the energy was gone .. just no more juice after “fighting” hard during more than 60min to win this position. HRC were fresher and faster in passing the ball, our Warriors could not make the difference. The final was lost 5-1 and everyone watching the game celebrated the collective effort from the Warriors to push it to the end and to score a nice try just before the end of the game.

Well done Minis, great performance and very proud of you. It is a golden 2nd position!

Laurent Minaud
Head Coach Minis

Posted in General, Minis

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