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Robin Heymann

If you ever doubted the regard that school boy rugby is taken in by its participants then have a have a look at what it meant to James Forrester.

"It’s strange really but I always felt incredibly nervous playing for school. Almost as much if not more than playing for Gloucester. I think the fact you have been at the school so long and all the guys in your team are your best mates makes you care so much about the result, you just don't want to let any of your buddies down!"

This coming from a man who represented England at a young age and captained his country in sevens, before having his career cruelly curtailed by injury, at far too young an age. With the recent National School Sevens coming to a conclusion UR7s went behind the scenes of a traditional leading light of the competition St. Edwards School Oxford to learn more about sevens from a school’s perspective.

Ryan's regime

In recent years "Teddies" (as they are affectionately known) have built a reputation as one of the leading all round Co-educational Boarding Schools in the UK. It’s an environment that shrouds itself in excellence in the daily activities that the 700 or so adolescents must undertake.

When attention turns to rugby though, the 1st XV take up their place on a notoriously difficult circuit against a string of elite and larger independent schools often making the ‘Michaelmas Term’ a perennial struggle for Teddies. Yet upon return from the yule-tide festivities and freed from the shackles of the rigid fifteen-a-side format they tend to be a different animal. A celebrated period in the sevens history of the school was when the now England Coach Ben Ryan held the reins as Master In Charge of Rugby. Stats don’t lie, during Ryan’s tenure he achieved an 82% success rate in matches won, including a sensational 40 match winning streak.

“I loved the schools seven's circuit. We were not a big school numbers wise, but with sevens it gave us a chance to mix it with the big schools that were not on our circuit. It also gave the boys belief by going well and winning some big tournaments as well as seeing who the talented players out there were - and there were a fair few - James Forrester was in that side and was unbelievable in the sevens format,” said Ryan.

Jon Goodridge was another talent and key protagonist that was quickly snapped up by Gloucester and at one stage of Ryan’s reign there was a pupil from the school playing at every representative England level possible.

The highly revered annual National School Sevens is the unofficial UK National Championships that is a seemingly fitting finale for the schools sevens season. Celebrating its 70th birthday this year for many it’s a true yardstick to see where a school stand in the scheme of things seven-a-side wise. A number of the game's most decorated players have successfully graced the playing fields of South-West London over the years, gaining valuable experience in competitive rugby at a young age. Messrs Dallaglio, Sackey, Underwood, and de Glanville will tell you the tournament was one of many small stepping stones in their development. Whilst Gareth Edwards, Millfield School’s greatest alma-mater, is probably the most high profile schoolboy to twinkle his toes at the event.

"It served up some great memories for me. In the six years I was there, we managed to win all our group games, two quarters and hit four semi-finals. In my first year we lost to Wellington by a score after having an opportunity to score, that was turned over and Wellington went the length for the winner. St Edward's had some really good battles against Wellington on the sevens circuit beating them in various finals but never at National Schools" said Ryan.

In-fact had it not been for the eminence of Wellington with a wealth of talent to call upon, Teddies would have certainly ended their National Schools drought and took home the trophy for the first time.

"Over the six years, Wellington had James Haskell, Thom and Max Evans, Dominic Shabbo, Tom Williams, Ben Russell, Stuart Mackie, Kai Horsmann and Adrian Jarvis amongst others in their side - not a bad pool of players to choose from!! The St Edward's players were not in that class but they played some great sevens over the years and had a fantastic team spirit," added the England Coach.

Breaking down barriers

So has Teddies appetite for 7s continued well into the ‘noughties’ with Ryan now moved onto to bigger and international pastures? The class of 2009 are manned by Mark Hanslip and he says Ryan’s legacy for playing entertaining and enterprising rugby is still very much in evidence from the boys in blue. With the shortened form of the game requiring players with creative nous, imagination, and flair these attributes have filtered into the mind set of the rugby loving pupils and are set to remain.

The build up to National Schools had gone to plan for Hanslip’s charges making steady improvements in the push for the major silverware. They lit up the Christ College Brecon 7s, dealing with some key injuries maturely, reaching the semi-finals with the obvious standout man Olly Hargraves crossing the whitewash 11 times. Further strides were made at the Windsor Sevens a few weeks later but striving for consistency and ability to hold onto games seemed to be an ultimate concern and a feature of the season for the young bucks.

Another interesting feature about schoolboy sevens is the fact the players are taken out of the comfort zone of playing the usual schools they face year on year in fifteens to locking horns with school boys form other areas of the country and backgrounds.

"Sevens gives them a chance to play other schools they normally meet and enter competitions nationally. I loved that. It also showed them that it’s not just the fee playing Public Schools that have all the talent. Coming from a state school, I was keen to make sure they understood that and saw rugby breaks downs all sorts of barriers", stresses Ryan.

The National Schools also appear to be signing from the same hymn sheet in recent years. The tournament now reaches to Comprehensive and Grammar school pupils throughout the UK. But the growth doesn’t stop just there is now a distinctly global feel in South West London during tournament week, with teams from Switzerland, India, West Indies, Ukraine, Romania bidding for silverware in recent years. The camaraderie that sevens fosters from people from different backgrounds is one of the special elements of the sport and one that for many uniquely make it distinctive to it’s 15-a-side older brother.

No matter what level of tournament sevens you find yourself in, the golden unwritten rule is to win your first game, building momentum confidence, and meaning you don’t have to force things in the other group stages games. This is particularly the case at the Nationals with it taking in such a large quantity of schools meaning effectively losing one match writes off any realistic hope of advancement to day 2. Teddies couldn’t quite heed to this rule going down 24-14 to Birkdale in their opening fixture, with Hanslip blaming a ‘basic lack of first up tackling’ which any coach will tell you, will ultimately kill you. It was very much a case of back to business in their next fixture after a rollicking with Berkhamsted feeling the backlash with a 39-0 win. More inconsistency followed losing out to a talented Perse School 24-17. Before finishing their campaign against Blundells.

"The best way to summarise our season would be in the last game. We scored 4 tries to the oppositions 3, but somehow still managed to lose 20-21", said a disappointed Hanslip. Sevens is a cruel sport and it seemed the results didn’t do justice to how the games went.

With Hanslip coaching at England Under-16 level he recognised much of the talent on show at Rossyln Park and ultimately knew his boys would struggle to make large inroads, even if they had reached the knockouts.

"They were a great set of boys who worked hard, but when you watched the likes of Wellington and Epsom, we were in a different league in terms of pace, power and technical ability."

Making the grade

So is the National Schools Sevens still a genuine conveyor belt for spawning future stars of the game? The answer still very much seems to be in the affirmative. Although England Sevens has enjoyed continuity in selection in recent years there will always be space for the development of youthful exuberance. A recent success story as been Charlie Simpson Daniel – yes that’s right, brother of James – who captained Sedburgh School to victory in the Open Tournament here in 2008. He caught the radar of scouting Ben Ryan and made the seemingly swift transition to international sevens as part of the IRB World Sevens Series.

"I watched him last year and was pretty impressed - nine months later and he was in a full England Sevens Shirt in South Africa at the George Sevens," said Ryan.

With Hong Kong clashing with the Schools Sevens this year, the England Coach was not there in person, but had spies to cast their eye on shining lights for him, and made sure he got himself to a couple of the lead up tournaments. Ryan also dreams of creating an England Schools Sevens side and what a treat it would be to have a International Schools Sevens World Cup again, with the very first of its sort held in 1979 with HRH Prince Phillip on hand to present the cup to England who beat Italy 32-10.

Yet as well as development to International Sevens, how important is this format for producing top quality operators for the 15s game? Who better to ask then the man who conquered both formats, Forrester himself.

"Sevens aided my game a lot, the skill sets are so different and it puts those skills under the spotlight. For example how many times in reality in a game of 15s would I as a back rower need to throw a 15 Metre pass of my left hand, or how often would I have to defend somebody like Ian Balshaw in 20 metres of space as you may well have to do at the National School Sevens.

"The effect this has is these skill sets are dramatically improved, and can give you huge boosts of confidence. Then when you are playing in the Premiership at 15's you may well have the skill and confidence to throw that long 15m pass off your left hand!"

With Forrester himself pointing out, the standards of school sevens are rising exponentially year on year and this schools treasure can only increase in value and prestige for the future of our game. And who knows it maybe wishful thinking but it can follow in the footsteps of Jamaica, hosts of the National Boys and Girls Athletics Championships.

Now what sounds like a glorified school sports day is anything but, with ‘The Champs’, as its dubbed, attracts 30,000 people on the island and acts as a chief breeding ground for future Olympians. Just ask Usain Bolt who meandered around the 200m at the 2003 event in 20.23 as a 17 year old!

It might seem rather anomalous to compare such completely different events but the key point here is the investment that Jamaica have put into their young athletes. 11 Olympic medals on the track in Beijing tell its own story. With Sevens (hopefully!) gaining Olympic status in October this too could lead to a greater level of significance for schools sevens on all sorts of levels, not just in the UK but in other countries also. The future could be very golden indeed and as Ryan rightly points out, nothing is impossible for whoever the guardians of the game are.