Nine East Lothian rugby players selected for national age grade squads
Above: Andy Horne (PL) and Finn Hobbis (NB), both selected for the National U18 squad
East Lothian schools have once again underlined the progress being made with rugby in the region by contributing nine players to the national age grade rugby squads that were announced recently. This is a credit to the current work going on in local clubs and schools and the propgress being being made with rugby programmes across the county.
The national U18 squad features three ex Pais athletes in the current squad. Finn Hobbis from North Berwick and Andy Horne from Preston Lodge both train with the Pais programme and are part of the BT Scottish Rugby Regional Academy. This is the first time that Finn has been selected for a national squad while Andy represented Scotland at u16 level two seasons ago. The other ex Pais athlete in the squad is Cammy Hutchison who now attends George Heriots School but is also a member of the Scottish Rugby BT Regional Academy for the Borders and East Lothian.
Scottish Rugby has changed their structure of the U16 national programme by selecting two U16 national squads. This increases the opportunities for players to develop further by creating a wider base for talent coming through the performance pathway. Six players from four different East Lothian schools have been nominated for the U16 squad. These players were all standout performers for the Borders / East Lothian Academy team during the academy fixtures played earlier in the season. The players selected for the squad were Kyle Scott (Preston Lodge), Lucas Reid (Ross High), Paul Cunningham (Knox Academy), Roan Frostwick, Rory Darge and Gregor Mitchell (all from North Berwick).
There were other players that just missed out on selection and hopefully they are motivated by the achievements of their fellow athletes to keep working hard and achieve success in the future.
