Festival delight after clean sweep for U18s

WALES Women enjoyed a clean sweep at the U18s Six Nations Festival in Edinburgh this week.

Liza Burgess’ side defeated Scotland and Italy in 35-minute matches, before beating Ireland 17-10 in a 70-minute match.

There was a first-half try for RGC wing Nel Metcalfe and second-half scores for Dragons hooker Molly Wakely and Scarlets centre Lowri Elias who added a conversion.

The inaugural festival has provided the opportunity for progress as assistant coach Catrina

Nicholas-McLaughlin pointed out.

“It was a great finish for the tournament and what the girls deserve given the work they’ve put in,” said Nicholas-McLaughlin.

“The players’ game understanding has come on so much this week and they’ve put what they’ve learned on the training park into practice in matches.

“It’s the proudest I’ve felt as a coach, not only for the performance gains but for the group’s cohesion and team spirit throughout the week.

“They will kick on from here, they’ve experienced a higher standard and intensity of rugby and gained so much from the developmental format of this festival. That can only help them be the best players they can be in the future.”

Co-captains against Ireland, Gwennan Hopkins and Jenna De Vera were equally proud of their team’s efforts.

Hopkins said: “It was a really physical game but we felt we matched Ireland in that respect.

We’ve come so far in the last five or six weeks. Everyone has given 100% and you can see that with the results.

“It’s a really exciting time to be a Welsh rugby player. Having senior players like Siwan Lillicrap, Elinor Snowsill and Cerys Hale come into our camps has been really inspiring.”

De Vera added, “It’s been great to train and mix with the other teams, we’ve learned so much from that. It’s really exciting to see what can happen in the future now.”