SCORPIONS stung the opposition to take home the top prize when rugby fans in Swindon were treated to a spectacular display of seven-a-side action at the weekend’s annual Swindon 7s Rugby Festival.

This year’s event at Swindon RFC included both Elite-level and Social-level competitions, with the Social tournament one of only 32 across the country selected to be part of the RFU’s 24 Sevens Series, a national seven-a-side competition culminating in a Grand Final at the Ricoh Arena – home of Aviva Premiership side Wasps – in July. The Elite tournament, featuring a mixture of returning teams and newcomers, was a round-robin format, with the top two teams progressing into the Cup final, and the third and fourth placed teams contesting the Plate.

The Social competition comprised of two pools of four teams, with the top two in each progressing to the Cup semis and the bottom two into the Plate.

The standard of rugby in the Elite competition was incredibly high, with some exceptional players in action, such as Harlequins scrum-half Karl Dickson, who played for the Scorpions.

It soon became clear that the Scorpions and the Royal Navy Sharks would be the teams to beat, with both brushing aside the opposition on their way to their fourth round clash, from which the Scorpions emerged with a 19-12 victory.

After that, the Scorpions faltered, only managing a 12-12 draw in their final pool game against the Pursuit Warriors, although they had done enough to secure first place amongst the Elite teams in the pool stage of the competition, pipping the Royal Navy to top spot on points difference. Pursuit Warriors came third, with the 7 Bamboos fourth.

In the Plate final, Bamboos scored first but were unable to prevent Warriors from mounting a comeback to win 24-7.

In the Cup final, each side played attacking rugby and reached half-time with two tries each, although Scorpions were two points in front. In the second half, Scorpions’ experience prevailed as they added two further tries to win 26-10 and take home the £1,000 prize money.

The Social competition also saw exciting rugby, with Widden Old Boys and Richmond Renegades topping their respective pools and going on to face Smiths Rugby 7s and Swindon St George respectively in the Cup semis.

Widden battled past Smiths 26-24, while Richmond overcame a tiring St George 31-5, with the latter then triumphing 19-17 in the final to take home the £200 prize money and qualify for the next stage of the 24 Sevens Series – the South West Regional play-off at Exeter Chiefs’ Sandy Park at the start of July.

In the Plate semis, Teabaggers beat Marshy’s Madmen 33-24, while White Horse 7s were 19-12 winners over Painswick before Teabaggers took the honours in the final with a 26-19 success.