The season goes on, as the first XV crushed Loughborough in the quarter finals of the Papa John Community Competition on Saturday. Up against a massive pack of forwards, we were without a regular loose-head, but Anthony Batchelor and Danny Phillips came in and inter-changed the position to help us achieve the ball needed to unleash our backs, who were too good for the opposition. Early tries by John Brear and Ed Gray gave us the lead and after resisting enormous pressure we clinched the tie with second half efforts from Kofi Miller (2) and Freddie Spencer. Alex Johnston came into the side at centre and apart from playing well, kicked 2 penalties and 4 conversion (3 from the touch line) to extend our margin of victory to 39-19. Read John Warner’s full report on the website

This week we are at home in the semi-finals against Aldwinians and we don’t know much about them. They were established in 1936 as the old boys of Audenshaw Grammar School on the eastern fringe of Manchester. Their most famous alumnus is Eric Evans who moved to Sale and played 32 times for England, captaining if the side for 3 seasons including a Grand Slam in 1957

They play in in Counties 1 (Lancashire and Cheshire) and in the season just finished they came third behind Widnes with a 16-6 record. You may recall they made it to the final last year when they lost to Widnes, who beat us in the semis. This year they have put out Shreswsbury (45-0) and Aspull (33-12) to get this far, so it looks like it will be a tight game with a place in the final at stake. The organisers of the Competition have arranged the finals for the southern games at Twickenham with the northern finals going to the equally prestigious and distant venue of Darliington – so much for levelling up!

The Colts played their final game on Friday, over the hedge at Old Leamingtonians, who have recently won the County Colts Cup. We were hopeful of running them close with our young side, but unfortunately it didn’t go as planned. Fin Cassidy, Luis Erinmez and Felix Malia all scored tries, with Fin and Tom van der Hoven each converting one, but the opposition did rather better and we lost by 62 points to 19.

Dan Johnston has added the following note on the Colts - Overall the Colts have had a good season, entering September with about 18 regular players, mainly inherited from the Junior side. This has now increased to over 25, and approximately 30 players have pulled on the jersey this season. I can’t overstate what a fantastic achievement this is - many local clubs have struggled to get a Colts side out during the season, as Gary Harvey’s constant work to arrange fixtures has proved, so to increase our squad to a point where we regularly have 5 substitutes on game days is a real tribute to the coaches.

Thanks also to the Senior squad - over the season the Colts have trained regularly alongside the grown-ups. Not only has this encouraged all the squad to develop their game, but it’s been great to see how easily the transition to playing for the senior sides has been for the half dozen or so Colts that have had that privilege (with 3 players making extremely accomplished 1st team appearances). We also had 8 players selected to play for South Warwickshire in a winning campaign against the other regions, and 4 of those players are now training with the full Warwickshire Colts squad - all four are in with a real chance of gaining caps against other Counties this May, which would be a real feather in the cap for the club as they are all ‘home grown’ players.

As we head into the summer close-season there are some dates to confirm

The Club Dinner will be on Sunday 26 May at 6.30 for 7.00. Ethan Waller (the Northampton Saints prop) is our guest speaker. You will have spotted already that the arrangements are a little unusual this year with us moving from the traditional Friday night to the Sunday prior to the Spring bank Holiday. The food will be unusual too in that it will be externally prepared with a starter of Chicken Skewers and a main course of Hog Roast. The meal will commence at 7.00 with the speaker at 8.00 and awards to follow. The price is £30 per person (a little higher than usual due to the unusualness). If people wanting to attend could make a bank transfer in the appropriate amount to the club account (sort code: 16-23-15, account: 11851701 and use reference “Dinner” and your name(for smart arses this means your actual name not “your name”. Please also email the club: lrufc@outlook.com to confirm attendance? If people who wish to sit together and want to email confirmation as a group that would be useful for seating planning. Should be good fun!!!”

As far as I am aware the Colts have now finished their programme, but the U14 still have a game to play – against Claverdon this Sunday and they will also entertain a touring side

The AGM will be held on Wednesday 24 July – please put it in your diary

The autumn international tickets for the games at Twickenham went on sale to clubs last week and I have managed to order the club allocation of 28 for each of the New Zealand, Australia and South Africa games. There is also the opportunity to purchase unlimited tickets for the Japan game which is outside the allocation but subject to overall demand. Further details on application arrangements next week

John Lyons
johnlizlyons@btopenworld.com