The IRFU Tag Finals were held on Saturday 7th August at Suttonians RFC. The event was very well organised and 7 pitches were utilised throughout the day to accomodate all the teams.
6 teams from Ulster entered the finals. The Jocksons, Wolfpack, Mengal Tigers, Lisburn Hairy crabs, City Church, and Goldblatt McGuigan.
Honours on the day go to Wolfpack who were absolutely outstanding. They emerged the outright winners of the C League, and are now crowned the best team in Ireland at the C Grade.
They were brilliant, and every member of the squad was instrumental in their victories. Special mention goes to Keith Pyper who engineered a spectacular try in the dying second of the Quarter-Final to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat! It must be said that every member of the squad was utilised in the lead up to the try, an awesome display of team work.
They had made a weekend of it with close friends and family on the side lines supporting.
The final was no foregone conclusion but Wolfpacks professional and disciplined approach was on plain view when at the kick-off they seemed to purposely sit back and almost will the opposition to attack. From this intial wave of attack Wolfpack learned the measure of their opponents and duly pounced. It took the opposition to 2-3 minutes to score in the oppening phase of play, but it took Wolfpack about 30 seconds in their first sustained phase of play.
They were simply superb and emerged the clear victors to claim the title. The ensuing pitch invasion was fantastic and you will see from the pictures on the link below the delight they all felt, as well as a game by game collection of action shots
Very well done to Wolfpack!
Mengal Tigers began with a series of 4 back to back victories. The pace of the A League was staggering. Absolutely no room for error at all. They got off to a good start only to be stopped by what was an extremely well organised opposition in their 5th game. 
The Mengal tigers individual skills were just as good as any but the opposition used two extra tactics very well. One – they constantly rotated players. Atleast every 2 minutes they changed 4 players. This is perhaps a tactic to be adopted as they did seem less fatigued in this game. Two – they scored atleast three interception trys. Perhpas this was due to being less fatigued.
Playing the percentages is the lesson here, and it will be interesting to see how the Mengal Tigers respond to this challenge next year.
However, all was not lost and the Mengal Tigers went on to contest the
Plate final. They emerged victorious and were duly crowned plate champions. This leaves them 3rd place in all four provinces of the IRFU. Undoubtedly a very high accolade!
We must also highlight the battling spirit of Lisburn Hairy Crabs, The Jocksons, Goldbaltt McGuigan and City Church.
City Church were outstanding in all their games making it through to the later stages of the cup and narrowly missing out on victory. For a team with only 2 seasons of tag under their belt they are surely one to watch. Goldblatt McGuigan had a frustrating day, but they never once stopped enjoying their rugby. Lisburn Hairy Crabs got some victories and did themselves proud in what was a very competitive league as did The Jocksons in the B League.
The dissapointment of not winning is agonising, and it would have been great if all the Ulster teams had won. But that is the nature of competitive rugby and we hope these teams do not stop honing and improving their squads and tactics, and everyone will have learnt something from the experience. We congratulate everyone on getting involved and it is great to see so many teams from Ulster qualifying for the finals. We have to remember these are the best teams in the IRFU. To reach the finals is a brilliant result.
We have covered all the teams in the slideshow of pictures on the link below.
290 IRFU TAG FINALS PICTURES SLIDESHOW CLICK HERE
Pictures can also be searched individually and downloaded free from the GALLERY at the top of the home page.
Tag rugby continues on the 29th August with the Action cancer Tag Rugby Charity tournament at The Pavilion Stormont on Civil Sercie RFC grounds. We will be covering the tournament on Intouch. To register a team you can check out more details on the story on the homepage or visit the Ulster Tag Facebook page on the link below.
Don’t Forget To Join The Ulster Tag Facebook Page Click Here
