Last weekend saw all four of Skolars junior teams in action. We start with the under 12s, who hosted Elmbridge and went down to a 14-36 defeat.
The Skolars under 14s produced another outstanding display following their Shield Finals display from the previous week, defeating St Albans 30-24. The Skolars made hard work of it however, as they were 20-4 up after 20 minutes following 2 tries from Jerome Yates, 1 from Dillon Adabie and 1 from Omar Benhoura, with Yates adding 2 goals. St Albans clawed themselves back into the game in the second half getting within 6 points but Skolars always had enough and added tries through Adabie and Benhoura again, with Yates kicking one more goal. Man of the match was Omar Benhoura for his fearless running and excellent support play.
The under 16s looked to make a turn around from last weeks disappointment in the cup when they took on Elmbridge Eagles. The first half started promisingly, with Skolars opening the scoring through Bence Balogh. The try came from a well worked cross field kick but the conversion was missed by Ahmet Kobra. Elmbridge struck back immediately to make the score 6 – 4. After this try Skolars never regained the lead, but played some quality Rugby League and defended brilliantly. Anthony Barry scored just before half time to give the North London team a glimmer of hope going into the last 30 mins. At the start of the second half the scores where 12 – 10, but a lack luster second half defensive effort left the final score 50 – 10. The under 16s will now take some time to work on and improve their defensive effort, and will look to put in a big performance against Eastern Rhinos in two weeks time.
London Skolars U18s played in a hard fought battle against Greenwich Admirals U18s in the London Youth Semi Final Cup game. This game was always going to be a tough one. The players played as hard as they could and left nothing out there. It was a warm day in Greenwich and perfect Rugby League conditions. With both teams having very good packs the ball was played down the middle with some success. Greenwich Admirals half back pulled the strings well and shipped the ball wide when they could. The second half started with Greenwich widening their lead to 12 and again to 16 making the score 30-14. But Skolars U18s slowly clawed their way back into the game with some good completion and possession in Admirals U18s half and also some good individual efforts coming from David Ogufere scoring 2. Captain Louie Sutherland took his tally to 14 for the season and also leading in the race for top try scorer for the whole of the Juniors. Anthony Kaana’s impressive push paid off by getting on the end of a pass and scoring in the corner for his first Rugby League try. Sahid Kpaka went the full length of the field to put London Skolars U18’s within 6 points of Greenwich. But Skolars took their foot off the gas allowing Greenwich to score taking the score to 34-24. A late try by Jack Clover made Skolars fight till the very last minute but they just ran out of time. End score 34-28. Good luck to Greenwich Admirals U18s in the Final.
