Friday the 24th of July saw Percy Park RFC host the first Friday Night Lights 7s tournament. Eight local teams entered for a night of sevens, Seaham, Westoe, Ashington, North Shields A and B, Mighty Peth, Percy Park Sharks and a Percy Park Acadmey team from 2011.
The eight teams were split into two groups of four; Group A, had the luxury of playing on the first team pitch and in front of a good gathering of supporters. It consisted of the two Percy Park teams, North Shields A and Seaham RFC.
Westoe, North Shields B, Ashington and Mighty Peth made up Group B. The night saw some good running sevens with the dry, warm night doing its part in making for an entertaining night of rugby; it was evident from the start that there was a contrast in styles from team to team, some teams choosing to stick to the 15 a side style while others adapted to the free flowing 7s style of keeping the ball alive.
Group A saw Percy Park Sharks dominate the pool with three easy wins to send them through to the cup semi-finals as top seeds, Percy Park Academy 2011 battled hard after their opening loss to the Sharks to claim victories over North Shields A and Seaham to go through as second seeds. North Shields A, were too good against a hard running Seaham team to go through as top seeds for the Plate semi-finals.
Group B was similar to Group A with Westoe and Mighty Peth coming through with easy wins against a young North Shields team and a never say die Ashington team, this set up the final group game to see who would go through to the cup semi-final as top seeds.
Mighty Peth a Northumberland Invitational sevens team initially had been tipped to be favourites for the tournament but it was Westoe who prevailed with good lines of running and strong defence to see them through to victory. Ashington found their form to put a good performance in against North Shields B to earn them top seed in the plate semi-final.
The plate semi-finals had North Sheilds A take on North Shields B and Ashington play Seaham. Shields A were too good for Shields B while a good contest between Ashington and Seaham saw Ashington claim their way into the plate Final.
The final of North Shields A v Ashington, was a great contest with some superb running rugby and contenders for try of the tournament, in a high scoring encounter, North Shields kept their composer and sealed the win.
The cup semi-finals of Percy Park Sharks v Mighty Peth and Percy Park Academy 2011 v Westoe showed the high standard and potential of 7s in the north east, the Sharks fought hard and kept Mighty Peth at bay to claim their spot in the final while Westoe battled in the first half but ran away with it in the second to get the win against the 2011 academy.
With the clock ticking past 10pm and the lights in full flow the final didn’t disappoint, the Sharks raced to an early lead only for Westoe to level it up at 12-12 with minutes remaining. The Sharks then scored in the dying seconds to put them 17-12 up, with the restart to be the last act of the game, Westoe claimed the ball and made their way down field, keeping the ball alive and playing from side to side, a covering tackle and a pile in at the ruck saw the ball turned over and hacked into touch to leave the Sharks with the victory.
Thanks to all the teams who turned up and made for an entertaining night, a lot was learnt in hosting the first Friday Night Lights and it can only get better from year to year. We hope to see all the teams again next year and hopefully more in addition. Congratulations to Cup winners Percy Park Sharks and Plate winners North Shields A.
Percy Park Sharks
Top Try Scorer: Jonny Ward
MVP: Damien Armstrong
Percy Park Acadmey 2011
Top Try Scorer: Michael Grove
MVP: Josh Lake