Rugby Report

Saturday 14 June 2025

Shore vs The King’s School (King’s) – Parramatta

A beautiful weekend greeted Shore teams heading out to Parramatta to take on King’s. The 16B’s and 16E’s stayed at Northbridge and set the weekend nicely with wins at home.

The majority of the remainder of our teams played lots of tough and enterprising rugby on the Doyle Ovals at King’s. Both the 15B’s and 15A’s had draws, showing how closely contested that age group is.

Our 13B’s made it three in a row, and the stand-out performance of the morning was the 14A’s victory. The team showed great resilience and grit to hold out King’s in the second half, and after absorbing much pressure, Shore scored a great team try at the end of the day.

Our Third XV travelled to Armidale on Friday afternoon for an 11am fixture against  The Armidale School (TAS) First XV. TAS started well and, against much of the common practice of today, chose to slot two penalty goals early in the game. It was an effective ploy as this gap essentially remained in the game, and the Thirds went down in a narrow loss. This puts them at one win and one loss in their Competition Round – a big fixture ahead for them on Saturday against St Joseph’s College (Joeys).

The Second XV had a narrow loss against King’s – starting slowly in the first half but then changing gear in the second half and dominating. They won the second half but just fell short of doing enough to bridge the gap from a slow start. Considering the injury list and late changes made, this was another effort that showed the fight in this team.

The First XV, plagued by injury, nonetheless prepared well for the game last Saturday and welcomed a number of boys making their debut – Tim Leahy, back from injury and Fin Shadforth and Ollie Greig, who have both played well in the Second XV. Shore knew King’s had a strong forward pack and would look to use that to their advantage – and unfortunately, they did. The King’s set piece at both scrum and lineout was very good and set a platform from which they garnered all momentum in the game. Bede Clout, Ando Stock, and Digby Hockey carried hard and valiantly all game, and Shore pegged back some late tries. A lopsided result in the end, but one that does not illustrate how the First XV has been so close in the matches it has played. With Joeys ahead this weekend, the boys are looking to create something special on Saturday. 

Mr David Mason-Jones
MIC Rugby