We entered into the Sunday Jäger Cup and after an ‘early night’ on the Saturday, the 20-man squad was raring to go against our first group stage opponents – The Other Men.

The Pink Elephants started off slowly, allowing The Other Men to score early on in the match. However, once the team got into their stride, there was no stopping them from running in tries. One notable try saw Alfie Lisle offload superbly off the floor to his support player to score under the posts. It was a good performance to get the tournament underway even if Malachi Connolly did miss a conversion from under the posts…… Final score: 43-13

Second up for the team was Banana 7’s who looked like a very strong team, again The Pink Elephants started off slowly going down 7-0. But with superb individual tries from Linval Antonio and Malachi Connolly saw the team pull ahead and a try saving tackle by man of the tournament Michael Burgess kept the side in the game finally winning 14-7. The final game in the group the Pink Elephants won through the opposition not showing.

Into the knock out stages of the tournament now and the team made light work of the St Paul’s Piranhas with a 21-14 victory to book ourselves into the semi-finals against the PC Pirates, this was by far the biggest challenge the team had come up against eventually winning 12-10 with thanks to a great try saving tap tackle from Jamie Pecorella.

A victory in the final was now in sight for The Pink Elephants who had to try and overcome The Wise Monkeys, however, the team was not prepared for the opposition in front of them. Credit to The Wise Monkeys, they were clearly a well-structured and organised sevens team who came out fighting. Unfortunately we were not able to break down their solid defence and lost to the better team 31-0.

The whole experience for the players was invaluable who will take what they have learnt through to next season where we hope to go one better in the Festivals tenth year of running. It was great to see such a good team spirit amongst the boys who travelled and looking back what a young side we fielded, which is a great asset to the club. With any hope the same squad of players will be playing together for years to come and create a real spirit at the Old Dunstonian’s that will be passed on through generations.

Tournament awards
Player of the tournament: Michael Burgess
Most tries: Malachi Connolly (5)
Best butchered try: Lawrence Reeve
Greatest potential: Jamal Gobir
Best Tackle: Jamie Pecorella