Solid start for the U13A rugby team

By Jake O’Reilly

On the 1 October 2022, the Hampton  U13 A rugby team took to the field against St George’s Weybridge and secured their much needed first win.

When the opening whistle blew, the ball was sent into the air and landed into Hampton hands. From there, the ball ebbed and flowed from  each team  until 10 minutes in, when the Hampton Full-Back Oliver Masuria – Hull sprinted down past the enemy Winger and opened up the scoring for Hampton.

However, after Hampton opened the scoring , the match turned into a stalemate, in which no team was able to cross the line.

Hampton made gains from the constant running of the pack, and were able to regain many lost balls in the process, but a problem emerged.

Whenever Hampton kicked the ball out of their 22, it ended up in the hands of the St George’s Full-Back, who would then proceed to run a hard line down the middle of the Hampton defence. This tactic worked, and Weybridge were able to equalise just before the referee blew the whistle for halftime.

When both sides returned for the second half, Hampton had to adapt their tactics. They began sending their forwards down the sides , catching the Weybridge centres and wingers off guard.

However, Both teams fumbled and dropped the ball. Hampton were able to capitalise on this, and scored 2 tries off free kicks by the fly-half and scrum-half respectively.

But, in the dying embers of the match, the Weybridge fly-half scored and gave his team hope going into the final play.

This gave Weybridge one final burst of energy as they ran down the pitch, but it was not enough to get past the Hampton full back, who took the attack down and gave Hampton U13 A’s their first win of the season.