Northampton Casuals 26 Hemel Stags Development 42
Location: Northampton

Hemel Stags Development team had a convincing win against Eastern Conference team Northampton Casuals. The game was played in perfect conditions for both players and spectators. The final score was 42-26 and on that performance there will be some players making the step up from development team to the first team in the coming weeks.

Hemel started well and scored a couple of early tries when Northampton finally got into the groove of the game and started to score some tries too. Hemel showed plenty of courage playing most of the game with fifteen players where Northampton had thirty players which enabled them to send fresh players on every five minutes against most of the Hemel players that had played the full eighty minutes and this was evident in the final twenty minutes when the Stags conceded three tries.

Hemel's Head Coach commented " I thought today was real beneficial for our lads, there were some players involved today that haven't played for a few weeks and this gave them an opportunity for some match fitness and there is no substitute for match fitness. Most of the lad's played full game and people like Jamie Acton, Andy Champ, Ernie Evans and Ian Grimes have definitely given me something to think about when I select the First team next week. Jamie was outstanding with the ball where he scored a couple of tries and was very aggressive in defence and at seventeen years of age he was the best player on the field. Andy was difficult for the defence to handle while both Ernie and Ian got through plenty of work both in defence and attack. Other pleasing performances were Anthony Strelitz who was coming back from a lengthy shoulder injury and new faces Chris Woods and Kyle Lockyer.

It was a great weekend for the club with wins for the under 14's, under 16's, Development team and the first team.