The 11th October 2023 will go down as a day in the history books for Strangford Integrated College as the first ever 1xv Rugby team took to the field, made up of a mix of Year 14, 13, and 12 players, experienced and inexperienced.
After a delayed start to the game, it was Regent to kick off with Strangford playing towards the fantastic sight of the digger preparing a space for our new temporary classrooms.
The match began with Strangford running some strong lines but the Regent defensive line holding strong. Some ill discipline from the Regent pack however allowed Strangford to gain territory in the attacking 22 and first blood went to the home side when Club Captain Jed, who today stepped up and played out of position at 12, crashed over the line from short distance with Ben adding the extras.
This gave Strangford the belief that, even though it was their first fixture at this level, they could mix it with the Regent boys.
The next score again, went to Strangford, with a wayward kick into the home 22 was fielded by Jed who did the simple stuff well (which isn't always easy!) and drew the defender in, before giving the pass to Ben, today at 15, who dodged and weaved his way around a number of would-be tacklers before dotting down between the posts giving himself a simple conversion to take the score to 14-0. What made this try a piece of beauty was how Ben carried the ball in both hands and consistently had support on either side throughout his run from Mikah and Evan, keeping the defenders guessing.
The half was then unfortunately cut short with one of our influential ball carriers, Benjamin sustaining a serious injury. But after a short while we were ready to kick off the second half.
Strangford started second half how they finished the first, with some strong carries and fantastic tackling from Ryan, Billy and Charlie in particular. This contributed to the third try of the game, built off solid defensive work and gaining the turnover. After some good phases of play, an overlap was identified and the ball was flashed out to Jed who again showed the benefits of running with the ball in both hands. A nice dummy and a shimmy of the hips Jed put himself into space and made a burst for the line where he scored his second of the day.
Regent then came back with some strong carries of their own, punching holes in the Strangford defensive line and finding themselves held up over the line as the bodies started to tire, but were eventually successful in breaching the whitewash, scoring a good try in tight.
Regent had their tails up and scored their second fairly quickly after with some quick thinking from their 9 who sold a dummy from the base of the ruck and went through the gap left on the edge.
Unfortunately from the restart, there was another serious injury sustained, this time for the away side with their prop needing to be stretchered off and we wish him a speed recovery. This injury saw the second half also truncated and, while Strangford came out winners on the score sheet, it was a very subdued end to what was a fantastic occasion for Strangford Integrated College Rugby.
Thank you to Regent for travelling and giving us the game today and we look forward to the return fixture in the near future.
