Middlesex 7s part 1 – Out of the cup and onto the plate

The Falcons gave their supporters yet more stresses a number of times in today's Middlesex Sevens tournament, but survived well into the afternoon by reaching the latter stages of the plate competition.

With a strong side including England Sevens internationals Micky Young, Charlie Amesbury and Rob Vickerman alongside Alex Tait and new signing Jeremy Manning, hope was high of the Falcons continuing their good sevens form of the summer.

However, our boys were not in action until 11.10am. Actually, it was a bit later than that, because after champions London Irish opened the day with a 31-7 mauling of Leicester, the HFW Wailers and Exeter played out a topsy-turvy match that ended 14-14 thanks to a last minute score from the Chiefs' Rob Coote. Exeter then scored four minutes into extra time to progress.

The Falcons then took to the pitch to meet Wasps. Alex Gray almost scored on the left but strayed into touch, before Charlie Amesbury fought through the Wasps defence to score under the posts, Jeremy Manning converting. Tom Varndell put in David Tait though for an equaliser, and Rob Vickerman missed a double overlap just before half time to leave the score level at 7-7 at the break.

Vickerman again broke in the second half and passed to Will Welch in space on the right, but Welch decided that coming inside to be tackled would be better than scoring. We lost the ball and Varndell raced upfield to put Wasps into the lead. Tait scored his second in the last minute to condemn Newcastle to the Plate competition with a 21-7 defeat.

I'm sure I wasn't the only supporter still livid about Wasps' second try after the game. Why are our players so afraid of space? With people around us singing You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin', I reflected that if Maverick had been there he'd have said to our team “Any of you boys see a try line around here?”

Goose would have said “Newcastle Falcons regrets to inform you that your team lost in the first round because they were stupid.”

Anyway, all was not lost. Our opponents in the Plate quarter-finals would be Saracens, who lost out to England's Help For Heroes 5-10 after extra time.

The Army and Kenya then beat the Gilbert Pups and Leeds respectively with little trouble. Wales' Amser Justin Time raced into the lead against Harlequins and were 19-10 up in the second half, before a brace from Nick Easter and further tries from Charlie Walker, Sam Smith and Ollie Lindsay-Hague Esq. sent the Londoners through 19-34.

The final place in the quarter-finals of the tournament proper went to 2009 runners-up ULR Samurai International, who smashed Andy Gomarsall's White Hart Marauders 5-38.

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The Plate quarter-finals began with the Wailers taking on Leicester with many of the players who had won the Premiership Sevens qualifier at Welford Road last month. There was to be no revenge for the Tigers, who had only a second half consolation try to answer scores from Tyson Lewis (2), Steve Parsons (2), Jack Smales, Phil Mack and Ricky Thomas in a 7-43 win, the largest winning margin all day.

Newcastle then came out to seek revenge on Saracens for our defeat in the final of the Premiership Sevens last week. The Falcons immediately went on the attack and Welch again missed a run at the line, coming inside and after the ball went along the line the final pass was just too far in front of Amesbury. Vickerman scored twice in the first half though, sandwiching Manning being held up, giving us a 12-0 half-time lead.

Manning was now starting to really pull some strings, and combined with Amesbury before the Kiwi scored on the right. With the score now 17-0, the game was won but Micky Young still made a fantastic tackle having raced across the pitch to prevent Ed Telwright scoring on the left, drawing applause from around Twickenham.

This result meant that there would be a derby of sorts in the plate semis when the Falcons met the Wailers. For me, I was just pleased we hadn't been knocked out before 2pm!

The Gilbert Pups then beat Leeds 33-5, setting up a plate semi-final with Wales' AJT, who beat the Marauders in the final last eight game in the secondary tournament.

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Attention now turned back to the Middlesex Sevens proper. In the first quarter-final, Exeter put up more resistance to London Irish than Leicester had but the Exiles were too good in a 26-7 win.

Wasps and England then played out a competitive match which didn't see a score until Varndell broke the deadlock after six minutes. The impressive Simon Hunt then scored twice for England in the second half, giving his team a 7-10 lead with two and a half minutes left. Varndell broke away however and secured a 12-10 win.

Kenya had performed well in their opening match against Leeds, but had no answer to the Army who led the Africans 21-0 at half-time in their quarter-final. With three minutes to go Malaki Magnus broke to halfway and then stopped, apparently not really wanting to score. When the ball came to Alosio Yamoyamo though, he did want to score and rounded off the 28-5 victory.

The final place in the last four was played for by Harlequins and Samurai International. Samurai scored a controversial try from a penalty that followed a chip forward – some fans considering the green-shirted kicker to have dived. Quins hit back with two scores though. Samurai's second try again came following a penalty, for a late check, and with a minute left the invitational side's third try won them the game 12-19.

So we leave part one with the Falcons looking forward to a semi-final in the plate against the Wailers, while London Irish remain on course to secure their title. If for some reason you haven't looked at the message board yet or any other source, wait for the morning when our team's fate will be revealed.