Jersey – Touch Rugby – the International Tournament 2016

We spent a couple of weeks on the gorgeous island of Jersey. One of the channel islands just off the coast of France but British. Our main reason for going was to support our daughter who was representing the Netherlands in an international, European Touch Rugby tournament.

Touch Rugby is becoming big- probably because of the injuries from playing rugby. As an ex-rugby player I found it really good to watch. It was fast, tactical and required a lot of skills and speed. It seemed like a cross between Rugby League and Rugby Union sevens with some weird rules and strategies of its own.

Here’s a few photos of my daughter terrifying all those foreign teams – like England, Scotland and Wales. I know – I told her – being a traitor to your country of birth is very dubious behaviour. She always had a mind of her own!

Hester is number 8!

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Out of Europe for the second time in four days!!

Methodical, uninspired, laborious, lacklustre, dull, fear-ridden, below par, unable to penetrate, boring, disorganised, shackled, with no passion or energy.

It was a terrible performance. England cracked under pressure. All the players underperformed. The manager’s tactics were woeful. The players looked like hamstrung puppets. When Rashford came on he looked like a breath of fresh air – unrestrained and willing to take them on. Why only three minutes?

Why drop Lallana for this game?  Was he injured?

The fault lies with the manager. A manager’s job is to organise the team and remove the fear that stops them performing. He failed on both.

What a miserable performance.