Under 18s widen their game to great effect

The Under 18s entered their second week of friendlies with an air of optimism. The last two weeks have seen the young bulls put in some fantastic performances and everyone was keen to see if the team could build on this.

The first half saw Hamilton taking the game to Livingston and using our speed of play to stretch the Livingston defence. Three times Hamilton scored with Livingston taking just the one try and a penalty. A lot of hard work was put in by the players to push our game plan and the ambition was obvious as the ball travelled quickly using the width of the park to stretch the game.

The second half had a similar result with another three trys for Hamilton to Livingstone’s one try. There were other opportunities as well but despite making seven changes at half time, the most important result was, that the level of play and the ambition never dropped off at all. The final score was 36-15

The fantastic video footage that we receive every week from Graeme Bruce allows the coaches to look at various aspects of the game and how the team is playing. One interesting development is that, with the squad trying to play a more expansive game, the overall number of passes made in the game has almost doubled from games that we played earlier on in the season. No wonder gaps are appearing in the defence of our opposition.

Thank you to Livingston for their invite and their hospitality. Thanks to Mary for the cover photo. Thank you also, to our travelling support who, once again outnumbered the home support. By all accounts the game was an enjoyable spectacle to watch.