The U14s team met in Zug station on Sunday morning ready for the 2 hour trip down to the Lugano pitches. A few brave parents decided sharing a train carriage with 15 boisterous players was a good idea and joined coaches Rob, Paul & Al for the day.

As always the weather down in Lugano was better than in Zug, however deep into October it was obvious that summer was well gone. Although it stayed dry throughout the day, the heavy rain from the previous days had already done its damage to the pitch.

Much to the disappointment of the club sponsors, the pre-match warm-up quickly saw the “Fern Wealth” branded match day kit completely covered in mud. The standard of camouflage was high enough that crack military troops would have been proud. The ball also quickly became caked in a layer of mud ensuring fans would be witnessing an “Old School” style of rugby rather than the usual U14 brand of free-flowing Barbarians rugby they were used to.

As always Zug played in the first match and this time it was against the Basel team. Having also travelled down by train but from even further away, they started the game in sluggish fashion enabling Zug to take a commanding lead into the halftime break. Already 4-0 up and looking likely to add to that in the second half, it was agreed we would take a man off as soon as we scored another. Sure enough, a minute or two into the second half, we extended our lead and started to play with one less player than Basel. This certainly helped balance out the game but Zug still held on to win 5-0. Were it not for a late headshot tackle by Basel ensuring one of the Zug player’s day was over the coaching team would have been completely satisfied.

The next game saw Lugano take on Basel and also walk away with a win but in a much more closely scored game.

With both Zug and Lugano having beaten Basel, the final match would be a winner-takes-all game. Having already had an hour's worth of rugby being played on it, the field’s lines were now completely indistinguishable. As you would expect when playing Lugano at home, the physicality was fierce. As both teams were covered in mud, the referee was obviously struggling to clearly see who and where the infringements were being made. All credit to the Zug players, they kept their cool and played hard but within the rules. Zug headed into the final minutes of the game holding on to a slender 3-2 lead. Having now been running in heavy mud for almost an hour, the efforts were beginning to take their toll as two players went down with cramps but regardless of this, Zug held on for yet another tournament victory in the 2024 season. Well done lads.