The past week has finally seen the return of some actual rugby down at the Haberden, albeit in a slightly different format to the fare usually served up at this time of year. After the Junior Academy kicked off a new series of ‘Friday Night Lights’, this week saw the turn of the under 15s to play some inter-squad touch rugby on the prestigious First Team pitch.

In the first match Billy Reid showed that he had lost none of his pace or side-stepping ability over the summer months with an excellent hat-trick. However, he may have a challenger for the title of squad’s fastest as the returning James Walshe showed impressive speed to score a great consolation try.

The second match saw an expert performance from last season’s player of the year George Howard, guiding his team to a close fought victory. The only try was scored by Ben Nevison-Grainger, although Oli Cooper, Josh Lane and Luke Neal were all unlucky not to score. In the final match, George Howard turned from provider to scorer as he threw a nice dummy pass and touched down for the sole try.

In what is obviously a rather strange season it was great to see the lads back on the pitch and enjoying the matches, and many parents in attendance too supporting them and the club. Next week sees the turn of the Foxes and Vixens squads to provide the floodlit match entertainment – the bar will be open from 6pm with a fully Covid-19 compliant setup, all welcome!