NORTH Midlands Under 19s will begin their defence of the historic Sable’s Head Trophy when they play old rivals Warwickshire at Droitwich on Wednesday evening (7.30).
North Midlands retained the trophy last season when they beat Warwickshire over two legs and will have home advantage for their first match this season.
The second leg will be played at Broadstreet Rugby Club, near Coventry, on October 21.
The winners of the trophy, a mounted antelope’s head, will be decided by aggregate scores over the two legs.
The trophy, which was presented to the Midlands Colts by a touring Cape Town and Stellenbosch Universities side, used to be the prize for the Midlands Colts Championship.
But North Midlands and Warwickshire are the only two of the six Midland counties still fielding representative sides at the under 19 age group and so the trophy has become a keenly-contested prize for the neighbours.
North Midlands will play one more match at Under 19 level, the annual friendly against Yorkshire at Dudley Kingswinford on November 29, before they start their preparations for this season’s National Under 20 Championship.
The county under 20s will play Cheshire at Sandbach on Dec-ember 13 and Warwickshire at Broadstreet on January 10 in warm-up games.
North Midlands will begin their championship campaign with a trip to Staffordshire, venue to be confirmed, on February 9 or 10 and then entertain Notts, Lincs and Derbyshire on February 23 or 24.
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