Tournament Report: DRF Sevens Series #1
BIRFC Women start the season strongly by taking Silver in front of the home fans at Jungfernheide
The team celebrating after the first victory of the day
With the start of the new season came new tournament formats, new players and new opponents. Irish started the day with 4 debutants in Gariup, Gebhard, Marchand and Shaw, and against new league members: good friends and former SG partners, BSC. Hermlin scored within seconds of kick-off to get the team off to a strong start. But despite scores coming through Shaw and Leo, chances were few and far between in a scrappy first half, as BSC showed themselves to be physical opponents, regularly disrupting the Berlin Irish attacks. A slight rejigging at half-time and some inspirational words from captain Babette Thron got the team gelling better, though, and a further 5 tries would be scored as the Irish attack started to click. Debutant Gebhard came on at Link and contributed with her boot, kicking conversions as well as providing the base for a beautiful looping backline move finished by Andraka with aplomb; closing the game out with a final score of 46–0 to Berlin Irish.
Only a short 20-min turnaround later, the squad was back out on the field against Berlin Bruisers, who exploited perhaps a lack of concentration or tiredness to take a 5–0 lead early on. Senior players however steadied the ship, with Thron and Sekulovic each crossing to take the lead before half-time. After the break, fitness and experience showed, with Weber entering off the bench and carrying hard to create several line breaks which could be converted by the wide players. Multiphase attacks wore down the purple defense. A series of offloads on the left wing between Vahldick and Sekulovic was stopped inches short of the line, yet support was on hand to spread the ball back across the field for Gariup to dot down and seal a 31–5 victory.
Captain Thron about to land the ball under the posts
With the new smaller division format this moved the club into the semi-finals where they would face the day’s surprise package: the young team of the Oranienburg Raptors, who had earlier pushed RK03 hard and beaten BSV92 in their group. Irish struggled initially with the physicality of the opposition, who played very directly, looking for offloads after strong central carries. However, the jackaling skills of Weber, and also Sekulovic, ensured that this was a dangerous tactic for the opposition, with two tries coming directly from turnovers (including a sweet 2v1 finished by Kohlhaas through nice footwork). Again, good fitness showed and, despite a late consolation score for the Oranienburger, the Irish were able to pull away in the second half to take a deserved 30–12 win and qualify for their first regional final.
Heading into the final against last year’s regional champions RK03, the team seemed confident they could cause an upset—particularly with their excellent handling and backline combinations. Unfortunately, RK’s experience showed through and despite them being short a number of first-team players they controlled the game excellently, starving Irish almost totally of possession in the first half. Nonetheless, heroic defending limited the Weißensee outfit to a solitary score out wide on the 6-minute mark, leaving a manageable 0–5 score line at half-time. Again, the team restructured looking to regain and keep possession, but the fatigue of the first half started to tell. Both Sekulovic and Weber were dragged down and turned over when support was too slow, and a flurry of late tries saw RK take a well deserved 20–0 victory over the hosts.
Vahldick trying to break through RK’s intense defence
Nonetheless, the team earned a very respectable second place to start the season, was able to blood a number of debutants and show that the hard work over the summer since the dissolution of the SG was more than worthwhile. With the next tournament in just 3 weeks, the Green Machine will be reloading, working on improvement points and getting ready to go for gold on 23rd September at Forckenbeckstraße!
Hermlin
Vahldick
Andraka
Leo
Thron
Sekulovic
Gebhard
Shaw
Weber
Gariup
Kohlhaas
Marchand
Kröger (pool)
Player of the Day: Aoife Shaw
Pictures courtesy of slices.of.time.and.light