St Benedict's Lambs

Published on isbi School News dated Monday 31st of March 2014

Three pupils from St Benedict's School, Ealing, were part of the U13 South East Lambs team which reclaimed the Uttley Cup at the Independent Schools RFC Regional Championships, which took place at Rugby School, on The Close, on Sunday 9th March. Oisin O'Cleirigh (Centre), Alex Szczech (Lock) and Thomas Goode (Prop) were in the South East team which beat the Midlands 42 29 in the deciding match, coming back from being 0 17 down at one stage. They had earlier beaten the North 59 7 and South West 46 17. Tomek Tsang (Scrum Half) had also played in earlier matches for the Lambs but he was injured for the Uttley Cup Championship.

O'Cleirigh was the captain of the South East team and he had a particularly outstanding day, scoring at least one try in every match. He was voted the 'Best Back of the Day' by the other coaches and Ron Mushiso, the U13 Coach at St Benedict's, describes him as 'one of the best independent school players of his age group in the country.' Tom Goode also got on the score sheet with a try.

O'Cleirigh has been selected to for the ISRFC National Representative tour to Dublin at Easter. Szczech and Goode both had superb performances throughout and were also offered tour places, however, they were unavailable as they had already committed to Ealing's tour at Easter.

All four boys have been great ambassadors for the School and have represented The Lambs valiantly and with distinction.

The Lambs were set up in 2006 to provide representative rugby opportunities for talented young players where they did not exist before. Their aim is to move away from over-prescriptive, boot-led rugby and give the players the opportunity to play 'Fast and Free'! 'We want our players to play heads-up rugby with the ball in hand allowing them to give full reign to their creative rugby abilities without being shackled by a win at all costs mentality. To win is good, but to win whilst playing the game in the right way is even better!'