Unbeaten Wimborne march on to take honours

WIMBORNE were crowned champions of Counties 1 Tribute Southern South last week after a sensational unbeaten season – and head coach Dan Draper believes his side are just getting started.

The Dorset-based side are on an incredible 27-match winning run carrying on from last season and Draper was thrilled for his side’s promotion to be confirmed after last Saturday’s 37-17 away win over Royal Wootton Bassett II.

He said: “It should have been done and dusted a little bit earlier but we had a couple of teams that were having a tough time and were unavailable to fulfil our fixtures against them. We had to wait and it all got bumped onto the Bassett game.

“We were really pleased with the outcome, it was a good day and the bus trip home was good fun as well!”

Draper shares that this term is a continuation of last season and is full of praise for his tender core of players and coaches.

He said: “It’s a very young playing group with the majority of them in their 20s, with only one or two in their 30s.

“We have had our captain No.8 Cam Taylor lead from the front, while players like Jay Adams travel 40 miles to get to training and games but still performs each week. Our young coaching team is led by Tom Moysey (player-coach) and he’s been instrumental to our success.”

Having secured promotion to Regional 2, Draper says that they are already building towards next season and realise the step up in quality they face.

“We’ve been to level six before and had a couple of good seasons,” said Draper. “One or two of our players were around 30 and tend to be in relationships, have children, work pressures become greater and they may have to move away, so rugby isn’t the priority anymore. So, we’ve been in rebuild mode since.

“It’s a physical league, players are quicker so we may have to recruit. Salisbury, Swindon and Devizes all got promoted out of level seven last year and finished mid-table, so that’s given us heart as we’ve beaten those sides in the past.”