Sports Update: Spring 2017 Week Four
After another extremely busy week for the St Edward’s sports programme, with teams competing at netball, football, hockey, rowing and rugby sevens, there is a real sense of progress and development across the park. From U14s to 1sts, As to Ds, whether netball, hockey or climbing, the progress being made by both teams and individuals across the school is clear to see and there is much to be proud of this term as we approach exeat.
Netball is enjoying a particularly successful term, both by way of the results on the pitch and the number of pupils that have been taking part. Saturday’s fixtures were no exception, with no fewer than 11 games against Tudor Hall, St Edward’s winning the overall fixture seven wins to four. Our 1st, 2nd, 3rd and U16A VIIs all recorded good wins, with the U16As playing a senior girls team. There were excellent results too for the U14As, running out 38-11 winners, and the U14Bs and U14Cs winning their respective games in a tightly fought 12-11 and a well controlled 14-2.
In the first event of their season, the boat club competed at Hampton Head on Saturday. The event is a popular one on the rowing schools circuit and there are very few of the top schools that miss it. St Edward’s crews have been hard hit by illness in recent days and we were unable to put out as many boats as we might otherwise have liked, but we had some very credible results in spite of the setbacks. The girls’ J15 coxed four finished seventh in their event and the boys’ J15 eight eleventh, but only 18 seconds behind the winners and ended the race as the fastest of the schools that take to the water in January rather than at the start of the academic year. The girls’ J16 also had a good outing in their first race as a quad coming fourteenth in a tough field, and the senior boys’ quad will have learnt much from their experience taking a decent twenty-fourth place in their event.
The U14 and U16 sevens rugby squads travelled to Merchant Taylors for an early season tournament on Sunday. The U14s won the Bowl tournament, beating Brighton College and Haileybury in the process. The U16s reached the Plate semi-final in their competition, drawing with Bedford 24-24, but losing out on an unusual tournament rule: Bedford scored first and, therefore, they progressed to the final.
The boys’ hockey squads were in action against Bradfield at the weekend with the U14As also playing in a County Tournament on Friday. Bradfield were the usual tough opponents they always are and there were some great games to witness, perhaps the best being the U14As 0-1 loss. Despite the loss, the boys’ performance earned the respect and praise of several of the Bradfield parents and their coaching staff. Elsewhere, there was a gritty 1-1 draw for the 2nd XI and a tight 0-1 loss for the U16As.
The football club had fixtures against Bedford on Thursday and Magdalen College School on Saturday, with the 3rd XI winning an exciting 3-2 win over Bedford on Thursday and the 1st XI bouncing back from a tough defeat on Thursday to record a 1-1 draw against local rivals Magdalen in a high quality game.
Header Image picture taken during the netball tour to Barbados in December 2016.