Under 14 and Under 15 Rugby Tour.

40 Boys and 5 staff departed Anniesland on the morning of Friday 11th
February. Unfortunately, the boat was delayed by 30 minutes from Stranraer and wearrived in our hotel, The White Horse, about 5 miles outside of Derry at 7 o'clock.

The first games were on Saturday morning against City of Derry RFC andresulted in two defeats against bigger opposition. Good post match hospitality with plenty of bangers and mash followed by ice cream seemed to ease the pain of what was to follow as we stayed at the club and watched the Scotland-Ireland game. (Or in the case of the staff was it the Guinness?)

Our next outing was on the Monday morning against Coleraine RFC, again
another large side. The games finished with one victory to each side. The afternoon was spent touring the coast and trying to avoid the waves as they came crashing into the Giant's Causeway.

The final games were against Foyle and Londonderry College, although not as big as the previous opponents they were definitely the most skillful side we played against. The under 14's went down heavily and the under 15's battled well to be on a par with the opposition with under 10 minutes to go, but eventually leaked two tries towards the end of the game.

Prior to these games we visited the Mayor of Derry and had a tour of the Guildhall.

Thanks must go to the boys, who were excellent ambassadors for their school and country and also to the following who sponsored various items for our tour:

Storagetek
Price Waterhouse and Coopers
Specsavers
Hugh Stirling Ltd
Stirling and Gilmour
Hunter and Clark Ltd
Jack Grant and Co
Paterson and Sadler Dental Surgeons
Blair and Bryden

The lasting memory of the tour is the excellent hospitality we received, not just at the clubs and school that we played against but throughout the whole region. I would suggest to anybody wishing to tour, either with a club or school, that you can't get much better than Derry and the North West of Ireland.

Barry

This article was originally posted on 4-Mar-2005, 21:39 by Hugh Barrow.
Last updated by Chris Maxwell on 5-Mar-2005, 18:22.