Vectis under-15s rugby team.
RUGBYVECTIS under-15s had a highly successful tour of Holland, losing only one match all weekend.
They began with a match against JRC Ducks of Boxtel, Holland, a mixed-age team thanks to Holland’s rugby set-up.
Ducks showed great courage under a barrage of Vectis attacks as the Island side cruised to a 38-12 win, tries coming from Will Yates, two, Haydn Ambler, Tom Hobbs, Aidan Price and Dave Greenough, and two conversions each from Harry Stafford and Aaron Burford.
Sunday saw the squad setting off early for the two-hour trip to the Hilversum International Rugby Tournament, where so many teams had entered that games were shortened to nine minutes a half.
In their first pool match, they went 3-0 down early on to a side from Ashford, Kent, however the Islanders bounced back strongly to win 10-3.
Their next encounter was against local favourites Hilversum but Vectis played the better rugby winning 10-0. The final pool game was against Towcester, who like Vectis had won both their matches. However, they found Vectis far too strong to make any impact on the game as Vectis cruised to a 17-5 win.
Having won their pool in convincing fashion, Vectis went on to play pool B runners up, a very strong Aylesbury team, in the semi-final.
During this tight match, Vectis fell foul of a quirky rugby ball bounce, allowing Aylesbury to score the only points of the game and win 7-0.
This result left Vectis to play Tavistock for third place and despite feeling very unfortunate not to have made the final, Vectis played with great style securing third place with a very convincing 20-0 win.
Tournament tries came from Yates, two, James Webster, two, Price, Isaac White, Tom Brown and John Turner, with conversions from Brown and Stafford, three, who also kicked three penalties.
The Hilversum man of the tournament was Richard Shoulder with Stafford winning the Vectis man of the tournament. The team’s front five won the Vectis vache prize.
The tour was a great success and the boys and coaches would like to thank their sponsors — Physiocare, The Kings Head, Yarmouth, Positively Mad, Hampshire Const-abulary and Wightlink — without whose generosity the tour would not have been possible.
• More rugby reports in the Friday, April 24, County Press.