Riverland High Schools Tag Rugby Carnival

Due to some unfortunate injuries a few years ago, the zone Sports Coordinators decided that the usual rugby carnival wouldn’t continue as students needed to be educated more on the game and how to effectively take/conduct a tackle. In 2019 Akesa (NRL Game Development Officer - Sunraysia) contacted the high Schools and mentioned the idea of having a Tag Rugby Carnival. As a zone we were in favour of the idea as it provided our students another opportunity to be active and have some fun while developing their skills in a another sport.

We believe it will be more popular in 2020 although we still had 4 teams attend the day (2 x 8/9 Boys and 2 x 8/9 Girls). The conditions made things difficult as some of the tags were flying off due to the high winds. The first few games were a bit scrappy as the students were still trying to understand some of the rules but through having Akesa and her staff umpire and assist during the games, the students improved dramatically.

Although most of the students would of enjoyed incorporating the tackle overall the students had a great time with the Year 9 boys team and Year 9 Girls (+ a few Year 8’s) playing off in the Grand Finals. The boys were dominant with Baily White, Angelo Otero and Maison Goodman weaving their way through traffic, before feeding a pass to a team member winning the game. The girls played a high quality/exciting game with but unfortunately they went down in extra time. The girls chased and defended well in all of their games which provided continuous opportunities for Tianna Ivanovic thy scoring machine.

Akesa and her staff were pleased with the quality of the games and are looking forward to working with the schools in 2020. They are hoping to visit schools prior to the event to conduct a few training/information sessions.

Thanks to Akesa, her team and all of the students involved.