Sidmouth Under-11s began their season with involvement in the The Land Rover Cup, a competition run by the Exeter Chiefs with the winners going to Twickenham for the Premiership final, writes Mark Williams.

The competition attracted the top 16 clubs from Devon, Cornwall and Somerset so it was always going to be a very tough day.

Grouped with Topsham, Kingsbridge and Ivybridge we knew very small margins would decide who progressed and so it turned out.

First up were Topsham and the nerves showed with both sides battling hard, but there were a number of mistakes preventing pressure turning into points and the game ended 0-0.

Next up were Ivybridge and now the nerves were gone the attacking power of Sidmouth put them 10-0 up by half time and looking very comfortable. However, injuries to two key players threw the whole teams concentration and this allowed Ivybridge immediately back into the game with a brace of well-worked try’s.

Now losing their set piece and under extreme pressure the boys managed to hold out until the last few seconds when Ivybridge finally breached their resistance and scored to win the match 15-10.

Now playing for pride the final group match was against Kingsbridge and the boys really put their bodies on the line with us nearly running out of replacements as injury after injury depleted the team and just as the previous match they valiantly held out until the dying seconds only to concede the winning try with almost the last play of the game and lost 10-5.

These were their first games of the season and every match in their group was decided by one score or less so all the boys can hold their heads up and march confidently into the coming season, they are a tough, resilient team and will only get better, well done boys you are a credit to Sidmouth RFC.