Young Red Devils clean up on the coast

Last season, bad weather denied the Marlborough under-52kg primary school rugby team a chance to complete a clean sweep at the annual Seddon Shield tournament - this time nothing could stop them.

The young Red Devils travelled to Greymouth with their eyes firmly on the glittering prize and, in the end, they made no race of it, scoring a staggering 265 points and conceding just 19.

First up they defeated Buller, who they shared the shield with last season, 53-0, then they accounted for hosts West Coast 50-7, followed by a 77-5 victory over Golden Bay-Motueka then concluded their triumphant match with an 85-7 victory over Nelson.

Jimmy Giles, a member of the Marlborough coaching team alongside Elliot Robinson, Buxton Popoali’i and Courtney Finau, said, “obviously, going into the tournament with only two returning players we were a little unsure how we would go. By the sounds of it most of the other teams had multiple returning players so we were wondering where we would be competing at.

“However, the first game against Buller saw us have a good win. We rolled into the West Coast game and another good win and just gained confidence from then on. Each game we saw an improvement and it soon became clear that Marlborough were an expansive rugby-playing team … we used the ball wide with both the forwards and backs all doing their job.”

Although only two players returned from last year’s abbreviated Nelson event, Jimmy said there was a desire to get the job done in full this year, which they certainly did.

Eight Marlborough players made the tournament team – Lockie Burgess, Hunter Giles, Anna Rewiti, Jay Crafar, Toby Johnson, Kenzo Tomasi, Archer Popoali’i and Mitchell Nicholas who was named overall player of the tournament.