Under 9's at East Kent Festival, Ashford

A lovely sunny day at Ashford for the second East Kent Festival of the season and Folkestone Under 9’s were again placed in an extremely competitive group.

First match v Ashford ‘B’

Folkestone controlled this game throughout, the Ashford side were very strong but were pinned back by a resilient Folkestone defence. Toby Walton made a couple of barnstorming runs upfield, the second of which was driven over the Ashford line by an all-team effort, Ashford defended, gained possession but spilled the ball and Tristan Parmenter, under pressure, pounced on the ball for a try to put the Stones ahead. Determined tackling throughout the Folkestone team drove the next Ashford attack in to touch and returned possession to Folkestone, Joseph Faiers worked his way into some space and sped through the Ashford defence to give Folkestone a 2-0 lead at half time. Folkestone’s second half performance was patient and disciplined. Folkestone continued to force Ashford into making errors and then kept possession well, Walton found some space and ran three quarters of the length of the pitch to put Folkestone 3-0 ahead. Folkestone didn’t let up, some big tackles flew in from TJ Leather, Tom Kedwell and Kian Supple that ended with Folkestone forcing turnover and Archie Green gaining possession, taking a mazy forward and running down the clock to ensure Folkestone closed out a 3-0 victory.

Second match v Canterbury ‘A’

Folkestone have previous experience of heavy defeats against Canterbury in this age group but have learned that key to stopping Canterbury attacks is stifling the supply to and halting the runs of Canterbury’s blue-booted player who is something of try scoring machine. Unfortunately Folkestone didn’t manage to stop blue-boots, whose second try involved dancing past at least three Folkestone players to open up a two-try gap. In the second half Folkestone got to grips with the game and Faiers and Walton both scored to reduce arrears to 3-2, in the final quarter Folkestone were the better team due to extremely strong and determined tackling throughout the team including a defensive effort by Parmenter five metres from the Folkestone line that swayed the game totally in Folkestone’s favour. Folkestone drove back up the pitch but with the Canterbury line in sight and the Canterbury players on their chinstraps a handling error meant the end of the game came before Folkestone could fully capitalise on their massive effort, a 3-2 loss but pride definitely in tact.

Third match v Sheppey / Sittingbourne

This was about as good a game of Under 9’s rugby I’ve seen and the noise from a fairly large crowd gathered at pitchside added to the excitement. Folkestone and their opponents defended stubbornly throughout the match. Sittingbourne / Sheppey are a very strong side but Folkestone matched them for strength, Lewis Hammerton and Thomas Reina holding the S / S pack before the Folkestone cavalry arrived and started to drive S/S backwards as confidence grew throughout the first half. The interval came with no score and the second half continued where the first left off with Folkestone mauling well and beginning to get more possession as S / S errors began to creep in under consistent Folkestone pressure. With seconds to go Faiers was felled by a high tackle and as the referee called the final play of the game Faiers picked himself up, took the pass from the penalty and squeezed over the S/S line in the corner to give Folkestone an extremely hard earned victory by one try to nil. To put this result into context, Sittingbourne / Sheppey came to Folkestone for a friendly in December and handed out a complete thrashing to the young Stones, this was a fantastic performance from the Under 9’s against a very strong side.

Fourth match v Ash

Some times you just don’t get the breaks you need! If ever there was a time when a two match break would have benefitted the Stones this was it but it wasn’t to be, one match separated the end of the Sheppey/Sittingbourne spectacular and Folkestone were back on against Ash (who had enjoyed the longer break – am I making excuses already?). Folkestone started well but were unable to capitalise on some good drives forward from Thomas Cloke and good distribution by Cameron Brown. Folkestone fell behind when an Ash coach strayed onto the pitch to help his team with Ash ten metres out from the Folkestone line, the Ash attack came around their coach and over the line to put Ash ahead. Folkestone suffered from two odd decisions at the non-contested line-out the first being a Folkestone prop being penalised for a knock-on before the Folkestone prop had moved to play the ball (reach for the Under 9 rule book), the second being the same prop being somewhat unexpectedly tackled as he caught the ball, spilling the ball and Ash moving up field to score. Still, Folkestone’s tackling remained resolute even if there was a little uncertainty when the ruck was formed. Ash kept the ball well (although they were allowed more possession than necessary) and Folkestone ran out of steam in a two tries to nothing loss.

Plate Semi-Final v Whitstable

This was a game too far for the Stones. Whitstable had the benefit of playing fewer matches than Folkestone and it showed at the end, the Folkestone boys also clearly felt the plate was an anti-climax after their efforts earlier in the morning and need to get over these disappointments if they occur in future and do themselves justice. Whitstable took the lead, then went two up, Faiers got Folkestone back in the game, Whitstable scored again for a 3-1 victory.

An excellent festival from Folkestone, the matches against Canterbury ‘A’ and Sittingbourne / Sheppey showing just how much the young Stones have improved and all can be very satisfied with their performance and confident going into the Kent Festival Prelims at the end of the month.

Squad: Cameron Brown, Thomas Cloke, Billy Evans, Joseph Faiers, Miles Gray, Archie Green, Lewis Hammerton, Tom Kedwell, TJ Leather, Tristan Parmenter, Ben Povah, Thomas Reina, Kian Supple, Toby Walton.