The 2013 Rugby League activity began officially last Saturday in customary fashion with the Liontrust Youth and Junior League 9s competitions being hosted far and wide across the region. The Skolars took their under 12s, under 14s, under 16s and under 19s to Medway, Elmbridge, Hemel and Medway respectively and enjoyed a superb days across the board, bringing some early season silverware back home to the New River.

The 12s in Medway played their first competitive games as a newly assembled squad with a handful of last year’s Grand Finalists joined by a keen bunch of 2012 minis. They learned a great deal and enjoyed 2 wins eventually going out in the plate semi-final and will be looking to go one further than their 2012 counterparts by winning the Grand Final.

The under 14s enjoyed a trip to Surrey playing at Elmbridge Eagles. Again they made the plate semi-final winning 2 games out of 5 bowing out to Colchester’s Eastern Rhinos.

The under 16s can be very proud of their day, although like their younger teammates their win ratio was 2/5 in the group stages, the 3 games they lost were narrow 1 try defeats to Brentwood, Medway and a last minute heartbreaker to Croydon. They met Medway again in the semi-finals however weren’t able to avenge their group defeat going down to the highly fancied Kent outfit.

Stars of the day were the under 19s who left off from the previous season in the same fashion, winning the 9s title to go with their 2012 Junior League Premiers title. The Skolars outfit lost only one game all day, a surprise one-point defeat to new boys Newham Dockers. They defeated their long-time rivals South London Storm 14-10, once again in the final, a repeat of September’s Youth League Grand Final and a rivalry that promises to be prevalent once again in 2013.