Walsall RFC Ltd

Of all the games and of all the days of Rugby played this season, Saturday must rank as one of th best seen at Delves Road.  The Colts Staffs Cup semi final followed by Walsall's first round of the RFU Papa John's Cup competition produced a festival atmosphere for members and visiting supporters.

Amongst the visitors it was interesting to see the presence of Neil Flethcher, ex Walsall colt and senior and Leicester Tigers player accompanied by Dean Richards, ex Leicester Tiger, England and British Lions No8.  I am sure they will have been impressed with the Colts performance as were the assembled crowd.

Ealier in the season Stoke had beaten us but with Walsall having been declared League hampions the fixture had the hallmarks of being a contest to look forward to.  It didn't disappoint!

Under the stewardship of Captain Josh Jones, the whole team produced a mature performance of quality rugby.  in every aspect of the game the squad dominated Stoke and won the contest with an impressive score of 50 pts to nil. Stoke played their part but were beaten by a squad that played in unison in defence, in attack and at speed with phases of passing that were extraordinary.  Every player deserves great praise for their performances.

The Colts are on the verge of achieving a very successful season, being League Champions, in the final of the Staffs Cup and in the semi finals of the Fred Rowley Trophy with a good chance of winning them both.  We wish them well and look forward to their continued success.

Following on from the Colts game was the first round of the Papa john's Competition took place between Walsall and our league opponents of the week previous, Melbourne. Having been beaten by Melbourne last week they must have had some confidence in repeating the result.  It was noted that they had introduced new players, made some positional changes possibly to give them the edge in the encounter.  We had two changes to our team of last week with the return of Dean /ainger and Michael Lockett.

The encounter got off to a fast exchange of play and within two minutes Melbourne had 7 points on the scoreboard, albeit it seemed from a dubious forward pass, missed by the officials and led to a worryig start.  Despite this early set back Walsall raised the level of their game.  We were strong in the scrum, mauls and line outs, unlike last week and displayed passages of excellent and exciting running and passing whish resulted in us scoring four tries with Dean /ainger, Dan Carpenter, Hansen Christoffersen and Toby Smith taking the plaudits.  The whole team supported each other and played well.

The result 26 points to 14 was sweet revenge and we look forward to meeting West Bridgford next Saturday in the 2nd round of the Papa John's Competition.