Oulton Under 8's played a very tough East Leeds team at the weekend and struggled a bit against their defense. Uphill in the first half, we couldn't really get on the front foot against them, they hit very hard - certainly harder than any other team we have played. They moved up in defense, tackled hard, hardly ran into touch and had good ball retention.

Our lads stuck at it, and got going a bit more in the second half and closed the gap but we still had a bit too much to do. We asked the boys to keep hold of the ball and not go into touch, and they did this very well - so a pleasing improvement on the previous week in the areas we worked on in training. The lads showed plenty of bottle against a team very different and much tougher than they have played against previously, so we learned a lot.

Their parents said that this team had played under 8's for the last 2 years - don't know how that would have worked, but they certainly appeared much more hardened than other sides we have played against. It does appear though from talking to other coaches that a fair few of the "new" sides in this years under 8's are in at least their second year at this level so it will be interesting when they split into divisions at Easter.

Good to see that Crigg U14's still managed a game today despite only having 13 available to take the field and a spirited performance to loose out by a couple of scores to Siddal, Also I was glad to have a chat with the 2 scouts from Cas & Hudds that were there and glad there is still some interest in the players despite of recent form.
Looks like next week will be another tough one as crigg have at least 2 of todays players away on holiday. Great to see the U8's taking to the field today and with the U11's and 16's having competitive teams the Junior set up at Crigg is definitely on the way up again.