Alton U14s 'The Reds' sign off season emphatically at Winchester

When Alton are on this sort of form it does beg the question of 'What might have been?' if they had shown the same levels of dynamism and commitment earlier in the County Cup competition, however progress is rarely a straight line.
Speed to the ruck has been has been a 'work on' for the whole squad (both U14 teams) all season and today was no exception, but such was Alton's strength across the park especially in our backs, it almost didn't matter.

Whilst there was no silverware at stake for either team, an Alton vs Winchester County Cup match doesn't need silverware to be meaningful. Whilst the score line might suggest otherwise this was a hard fought match and both set of coaches and spectators should be proud of their teams efforts.

Alton's mantra for the day was 'Go Forward' and 'Be Dynamic' there was plenty of both in spades. Alton opened the scoring just before the 10 minutes mark. Kasper Poulsen carving open the Winchester defense with a strong direct run off Fin Hinshelwood to score under the posts. Winchester responded almost immediately with the conversion missed Alton led 7:5 . It felt like this was going to be one of those Ding Dong matches. However 'The Reds' had other ideas... that was the last time Winchester crossed the whitewash!

Alton's second from a series of phases started by Hinshelwood a set of strong carries off 9 in the red zone sucked in Winchester defenders. Leo Holmes as the penultimate recipient made a dynamic push for the line however realizing he wasn't going to make it offered a perfectly timed pass for Hector Poulson to beat a final defender and score. Alton lead 12:5 at halftime.

Whilst Winchester were definitely winning the battle up front Alton almost had free reign out wide, Winchester had little to defend the raw pace of Kasper Poulsen, Jack Woolley, Stan MacArthur-Jones and Charlie Kavanagh. This is not to discount the stubborn defence and tackling which frustrated Winchester for the whole match. Led by Sam Gale the never say die counter rucking from the forwards allowed Alton regular counter attacks and led to a further 4 unanswered tries including a hattrick for Alton 'Man of the Match' Kasper Poulsen.

This was a fine performance! Well done boys!

Final score Alton 38 Winchester 5.