Two hundred and forty girls in 24 teams from 15 schools took part in the inaugural Lions Club European rugby championships at Sixways Stadium on Wednesday, March 16. There were three competitions: Mixed age group TAG, Year 7/8 contact and Year 9/10 contact.
Each team was allocated a country who have played in the Women’s European Championships and battled it out for the Lions Club Trophies.
In the Year 7/8 competition Chase narrowly lost to Woodfield 2nds in one semi-final and a weary Nunnery Wood missed out on a final place beaten by a strong Woodfield 1st team. The final was between Sweden (Woodfield 1) and Romania (Woodfield 2) with Sweden emerging victorious after running in some fantastic tries from their own half.
In the Year 9/10 contact the tournament was run as a round robin competition and with some very close games it came down to the wire. Ireland (Bewdley) won the league and then took on Italy (Nunnery Wood) in the final. Two well worked tries saw Italy clear and they eventually took revenge to beat Ireland and win the trophy.
The TAG competition saw some excellent running and passing skills from all teams as Luxembourg (Droitwich Spa) won Pool One and Russia (Aston Fields) topped Pool Two. Those two teams were then in action at half-time at Saturday's league game with London Welsh. The winners were then presented with trophies by ex-internationals Donna Kennedy (Scotland) and Karen Jones (England).
A big thank you to all the schools for their overwhelming support of girls’ rugby – without you the tournament would not have been possible. Thanks also to the Lions Club for their sponsorship and volunteer helpers and to the students from Worcester University’s women’s team for their help. Finally thanks to the Warriors Community department for hosting and refereeing the event.