Match Preview

Junior Cup
Plate Quarter Finals:

Considering this is Barnes Ladies' first campaign in a formal Cup setting we've had a relatively good outing so far, making it through to the quarter finals of the Plate playoffs.

This weekend we face Windsor Dames at our home grounds at Barnes. The Dames (like Lewes Ladies) are a National Conference 1 team, representing the South East West division. Windsor Dames have played 15 league games this season with one game in hand and they're sitting in a fairly similar position to Barnes Ladies in a comfortable 2nd spot.

From looking at the fixtures - and without being disrespectful to our opponents - it appears as though the Windsor Dames have had a relatively easy path through to the quarter finals, having beaten two NC 2 teams who are both down in their respective league rankings (Hitchin and Bideford) and both earned their games against Windsor by default as a result of Walk Overs earlier in the stages of the tournament.

We've put in good work to earn our place in the quarter finals on Sunday. Our last two plate matches have been against local London rivals Hackney, which we snatched away from them at the last minute with a final score of 19-17, and not so local opponents Lewes Ladies who we controlled a substantial lead over for most of the game and ultimately held to a 19-15 victory. Both games were played in quite challenging conditions, proving that we are very capable of digging deep when it matters and playing until the very last second in attack as we did with Hackney and defense as we did against Lewes who play rugby at NC1 level.

Kick off for the game on Sunday is 2pm and we hope to see as many supporters as we had at our game on the 20th March, if not more. This will be a big game for us, we're already making history for the club in getting this far, so let's put everything we can into taking another step up in the Barnes history books on Sunday.