Eastern Counties Rugby Union

Suffolk held its 11th annual Club Youth Sevens on the 24th September, on a glorious early autumn Sunday.

This is a unique event with club teams competing on the splendid and spectacular 9 pitches at the Royal Hospital School, Holbrook.

This is the traditional curtain raiser for local rugby.
50 teams from 4 age groups, from under 13s through to U16s from 14 different Suffolk (which includes north east Essex) clubs took part.
It was particularly good to see clubs with very new youth sections, Mersea Island and Mistley, and small clubs like Felixstowe, Harwich and Brightlingsea competing on the same stage as the more established clubs like Woodbridge, Hadleigh, Sudbury and multiple entries the very large Bury St Edmunds and Colchester.

All competitions were run as waterfalls or round robins, with every team playing 4 games.
Whilst this is very much a participation event, it is a competition, with all teams having the option of claiming silverware at their own level

At Under 13, with 18 teams, it was possible to run a true waterfall – the competition was seeded into 2 levels.
Bury A won the Trophy competition, with Ipswich A and Hadleigh taking the minor shields
Bury C won the Club competition, with Ipswich B and Stowmarket B taking the minor shields

At Under 14, 17 entries were divided into 2 levels.
The top 8 seeds played in 2 pools with each placing playing the correspondent in the other pool
9 teams played in a true waterfall for the second level.
Colchester A beat Bury A to claim the Trophy, with Ipswich A, Hadleigh and Colchester B the minor shields
Woodbridge won the Club competition, with Mersea Island and Ipswich YM B taking the minor shields

At Under 15 just 5 teams competed in a round robin.
Sudbury claimed the Trophy, with Woodbridge in second place.

At Under 16s, 10 teams were seeded into 2 pools.
In the Trophy pool, Ipswich A remained undefeated with Bury in second place.
In the Club pool, Colchester B were unbeaten, with Harwich & Ipswich B sharing runners-up spot.

Ross Cowie, Chairman of Eastern Counties Club & Community Player Development Pathway, who has managed this event since its inception commented “this was probably the best event that we have ever run; it was great to see the smaller clubs taking part. It was fantastic for over 500 boys to have the opportunity to take part in this unique early season event in the spectacular facilities at the Royal Hospital School. The whole evet took place within RFU core values, with no disciplinary issues, and all clubs competing with a fantastic cooperation and respect with each other – a really, really great event – a huge thanks to RHS for loaning the pitches, and to STC Teamwear for their support.”