November started off in fine style with Lewis Moody providing a coaching session on forwards play, dealing with rucks and mauls. He took the first team pack and they found the evening very beneficial as too did the club coaches from the Junior Teams. After the coaching session he came into the club to went into the clubhouse and everyone found him easy to talk to spend some time with the players and coaches.

Since my last Coach’s Corner, the 1st XV have won five games in a row and now sit in second place in the league with a game in hand following our postponement at Wigton. The 2nd XV Have had an excellent start to their seasoned also with some particularly pleasing results, however both sides have been hampered by the unavailability of some players. Having all players available each week will put is in a strong position to push on in the lead up to Christmas.

I feel it is very important that we have the continuity at training if we are going to improve, so it is important that players aspiring to play in the first or second team definitely make an effort to attend training on Tuesday and Thursday. Tuesday training has been moved to the all weather pitch at Ladybridge which is an excellent facility. We have been doing a lot of work in training on handling, attack and defence plays. It has been good to see that all players have shown a distinct improvement in their handling skills and it is very evident that the players are more comfortable with the ball in their hands. Our defence and attack play have also improved and this is becoming apparent with each match.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the ground staff for all their hard work so far and I know the players respect the fact that we play on excellent pitches and fully realise the amount of time and effort that goes into maintaining them. I was surprised that we were able to fulfill the fixture against De La Salle after all the rain we had had in the previous week and this goes to show how hard Ian and his team work. Well done!!

Also I would like to thank the Junior Section for the ‘Ball Boys’ at the Saturday home games and their coaches for coming down and organising them and the selling of programmes. All the year groups have done a great job and it has been good to meet some of our junior players who we hope to see pulling on the 1st XV shirt one day.

If we are going to move forward, as a club, then we do need to think about appointing a ‘Senior Chairman’, so if anyone would like to put their name forward or someone else’s name forward please feel free.