Bring the Noise 2 – Second round of player visits helps push game
As part of the promotion push around next Friday’s Bring the Noise 2 fixture against Wasps, (KO 19:45) Falcons players have undertaken another round of visits to grassroots clubs who are members of the Falcons’ Club Connections programme.
Set up to strengthen links between clubs in the North East and the Falcons, Club Connections has been a great success and has seen positive relationships between both the Falcons and local clubs grow.
There are now 43 teams in the Club Connections scheme as more and more teams are beginning to join.
The blitz of the clubs took squad members across the North East as the assisted with training drills for teams from Under 7s through to Senior Squads.
Sinoti Sinoti and Danny Barnes braved the cold to head to Houghton Rugby Club spending time with each of the junior teams working especially around the areas of capitalising on 2 on 1s and defending around the ruck.
Barnes and Sinoti were also keen to get involved in a game of touch and give advice to the under 9 and under 12 teams who will be playing on the pitch at half time on 20th February as Falcons play Wasps.
Uili Kolo’ofai and Andy Davies visited South Tyneside College RUFC and worked with the Senior set up and their promising Under 15s. Davies focused on attack play and passing skills whilst Kolo’ofai took more of a forwards approach to the session and worked on the tackle area and the breakdown.
Over 90 juniors greeted Gonzo Tiesi and Dom Barrow at Westoe RFC working with members of the club’s U12/13/14s age groups. Spending over 25 minutes with each, they focused on specifics with each age group.
The U12s worked on a lot of rucking games while the 13s and 14s looked at the tackle area and tackle technique. The session was rounded off by a Q+A, autograph and photo/selfie session with the juniors.
Towards the South of the region, Chris Harris and Zack Kibirige travelled to visit the Middlesbrough Under 17 and 18s to work on the contact zone.
Both players spent time with both teams going into the finer details of the tackling and contact zone and running the colts through some of the drills that they are put through on a day to day basis.
The blitz was rounded out by Mark Wilson and Mark Irving, who battled the snow and sleet to put on a scrummaging master class for Novos minis at Druid Park. A mixture of forwards from across all of Novos mini and junior teams braved the cold and were brought through some of the expertise of the Falcons forwards on body positioning and how to maintain balance and core strong whilst competing for the ball in the scrum.
To register your club to join for the 2015/2016 season, or to find out more about the programme please email andrew.matson@newcastle-falcons.co.uk
