Everyone at Ormskirk RUFC wishes a speedy recover to three of our players, John Pape, Chris Thompson and Josh Stratton. They were all injured while representing Lancashire at the National 10s Tournament at Rugby School.
John was injured in the first match taking a heavy blow to his right shoulder, fortunately nothing broken, but heavy soft tissue damage prevented him taking part in the rest of the tournament. A stray boot caused Chris Thompson to have 5 stitches in the lid of his left eye, despite his eye being closed Chris played the last 4 minutes of the final as Lancashire had run out of “fit” players. Josh suffered a double fracture to his left collar bone and is being seen by a specialist later today.
Lancashire’s injury worries deepened when Widnes Centre Chris Schofied fractured both his fibia and tibia as well as Stonyhurst’s James Morris being stretchered off in a neck brace.
Despite the massive injury problem Lancashire got through to the final where they met Yorkshire, the final had everything, high drama, great skills, a fighting come back, but it was to prove a bridge too far for the Lancastrians, the remaining 11 “fit” players were absolutely exhausted and despite their late rally could not stop Yorkshire taking the trophy by 20 points to 12.
All can hold their heads up high, many a team would have collapsed after losing 5 of their starting 10 players, but not this group. If Lady Luck had been on the Red Rose side then there would have been a very different outcome.
