ATbar

Community Sports Hubs

North Berwick P6 Tag Rugby Festival

North Berwick P6 cluster tag rugby festival at North Berwick High School was a great success.

NB tag festival 2

More than 150 P6 pupils from the five cluster primary schools took part in the festival which has been running for the last seven years down in North Berwick. Schools represented at the festival were Law Primary from North Berwick as well as Aberlady Primary, Gullane Primary, Direlton Primary and Athelstaneford Primary.

The format for the festival consisted of tag rugby matches on five pitches and skills stations running simultaneously. While the boys were putting their rugby skills to the test in the tag rugby matches, the girls were working on individual skills such as passing and catching, evasion, introduction to tackling and even some kicking. After a half time break, the girls then went on to play matches while the boys honed their skills at the skills station.  There were 8 girls team and 10 boys teams altogether and the experience of playing against other schools after a month of school taster sessions was definitely a highlight for all the children involved.

Fergus Pringle, the East Lothian Rugby DO stated:

'The benefits of tag rugby are that it allows the children to focus on the main skills such as; running forward into space and using footwork, basic catching and passing, offloading and working as a team. The more passes a team makes, the more points they get for a try. Smaller team sizes allow each player to get more touches of the ball, ultimately leading to increased skill development. All players are encouraged to find and utilize space using passing and evasion'.

The development officers from other East Lothian clubs were down to help with this festival and so were a group of senior pupils from North Berwick High School who are part of the ‘Community Sports Leaders’ group. They were working on developing their newly acquired coaching skills while coaching the younger primary school pupils. So not only are local primary schools involved but the local High School also plays its part in the event as well.

The development of rugby in East Lothian is a real team effort and everyone works together to achieve our goals of increasing participation numbers and the quality of players taking part.  East Lothian Council employ a rugby development officer to oversee this development and festivals such as this emphasise the importance of the links with the local authority and the local schools to provide great opportunities for the children. Players have progressed from this P6 festival to playing for the Borders / East Lothian BT Academy U16 team in the 2014/15 season.

Overall, the event was a great success and the noise and smiles on faces were evidence of that. The weather held out and this always helps at this time of the year.

 

Back to Top