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Senior News
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Officially, last season ended on the 26th of April 2008 with a 38-14 home victory over Henley and a sixth place finish in the league - our highest placing ever! Realistically, many of the club's players played on for several more weeks with charity matches and 7's tournaments. And now we are over a month into pre-season, with the 1st pre-season match scheduled for the 16th of August...the summer breaks are very short indeed for sportsmen at this level!
But we have been very busy in this period with numerous very exciting player signings and a specialist forwards coach to work alongside Shanners. We have recruited in strength and depth and it would be inappropriate to single out any individual for special mention. The key is that now we not only have cover at every position, but we also have real competition for starting places. This has already been shown in the quality of our training sessions and the way in which the incumbants and the new players have started to bond together.
We have a tough and varied pre-season fixture schedule this year which will ensure that everyone gets good playing time and a chance to impress the coaching staff. Ealing on the 16th will be a chance for the entire squad to get a run-out together. A week later, one side will be selected to play Rugby Lions in the evening of the 22nd and another side will play Bedford Blues the following day. Finally on the 30th, we will be hosting Worcester in our final pre-season match. Then it is onto the league season proper for the 1st XV and a final pre-season match for the Wanderers against Shelford 1st XV.
The league season itself will be incredibly tough this year with several clubs making a real push for promotion to League 1 before the proposed rearrangement of the leagues comes into effect. Birmingham and Launceston were relegated from National 1 last season and will be strong candidates for a quick return. Stourbridge start our season and were very unlucky to miss out on promotion last season. They are a side we have yet to win against and they will be keen to put down early season markers.
This season also marks what will be our most travelled year with five really long away trips (Launceston, Redruth, Blaydon, Tynedale & Mounts Bay). All away matches have been a struggle for us in the past couple of seasons, but this season is likely to be our toughest yet. We have always had a hardy band of supporters to our away matches and we hope that will be the same again this season.
In conclusion, no one puts more pressure on us than we put on ourselves. Our clear goal is to win every league game this year, and we think that we have the squad in place to achieve this. What we have to do is to turn that squad into a team and then give that team the skills and the confidence to achieve its goals. One thing for certain though is that this is a very competitive division now and there will be no easy victories.
We look forward to your support this season. |
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