Hampton Academy Year 7/8 Girls win the World Rugby 7s Tag Rugby Event

On Wednesday 9^th May, Mr Blount and Miss Barnes took eight Year 7 and 8 students to the Rugby Football Union Sevens Rugby event at Grasshoppers RFC to celebrate the HSBC World Sevens series.

Our girls met and trained with the England Ladies squad, as well as seeing three other international teams; England Mens, Portugal Mens and USA Mens. The squad included; (Year 7) Jasmine Dillon, Bella Thomas, Jody Wallis, Caroline Berry, Grace Griffin and (Year 8) Alison Connolly, Charlotte Gildersleave and Constance Ageymang.

The day started with two warm up sessions focusing on defending as a team and attacking as a team taken by two RFC coaches. Players from the Ladies team, including Sonia Green, Rachel Burford and Katherine Merchant, stepped in to help our girls warm up and prepare for their matches.

Our girls played two matches in their age group and came home tournament champions.

The first of the two games was against Brentford B’s, with a brilliant result for our team of 5-1. The first try, scored by Grace from a switch from Bella, blew Brentford out of the water, putting us in the lead 1-0.  Brentford managed to squeeze a try, equalising. Hampton then went on a rampage, scoring another four tries, Alison gave us the lead making it 2-1, with Caroline ensuring our victory, making it 3-1. Alison then scored again making it 4-1 and, right at the last minute, Caroline ran half the length of the pitch through a cloud of opponents to make it 5-1.

After a team talk from Mr Blount, the girls went into their next game all fired up. Hampton were now against Brentford A’s. Rain unfortunately blighted the start of the game and we slipped behind 1-0. An inspirational pass from Bella to Jasmine allowed her to rocket to the try line to equalise, 1-1. The girls managed to hold onto their lead and increase it with Alison scoring after a mammoth run from Charlotte down the wing, passing to Bella, then to Jasmine who slipped but managed a pass to Caroline, then Jody stepped in for a short pass to Alison making it 2-1. Brentford equalised after a slip from two of our players. The girls were still determined to give it their all and Jasmine went on to score 2 more tries, the match ended 4-2.

The girls worked incredibly hard and didn’t let the bad weather get them down;

Bella ‘We learnt a lot from the England Ladies Team and we put the skills and methods into our games. We had a lot of fun playing, the whole day was a success and I want to play more’

Charlotte ‘The best bit was learning how to work as a team to defend’ (video team tag)

Grace ‘It was amazing because we met the England Ladies Team and pout our skills to good use’

Jody ‘Everyone played as a team therefore we won both of our games even though it was very wet’

Jasmine ‘It was a great opportunity to meet the England players and it was a fun day. I learnt a lot and I used different skills that I didn’t know before. I scored 3 tries!’