1st XV Rugby Tour to Portugal

By Jack Fletcher (C), Year 13

In the October half term the 1st XV rugby team enjoyed a fantastic tour to Lisbon. On Thursday 20 at 1am, 22 players departed for Manchester airport and we finally flew at 7am that morning. Upon arrival we were greeted by our tour guide, Jao, and taken to our hotel. Right by the beach, we certainly got lucky with the location, although after seeing the waves, swimming was definitely off the cards!

Soon afterwards, we had our first training session in preparation for the first match that evening at a local 4G pitch, just a 5-minute walk from Hotel Tryp. Tired and hungry, we had lunch by the beach and later crashed in the hotel, shattered from the travelling. Now it was time for the first fixture against Agronomia rugby club, just outside Lisbon. Kicking off at 7pm it was a greatly enjoyable match. We fought well but, in the end, lost 2712. Ready for bed, we departed back to the hotel for the night, but despite the loss no one was despondent.

The next day we headed to the same rugby club for another training session. We played on a beautiful pitch, overlooking the whole city, then showered up and headed for the town. Here we grabbed lunch and then went off to the beach. Team building was a highlight of our tour and was displayed through the beach exercises, where we worked in groups to complete various activities. That was all in day two.

On Saturday we had a late wake up before going to watch a local club match, in which our tour guide Jao was playing. It was great to see how popular rugby has become in Portugal. Then we headed for lunch, later walking to Benfica stadium for our tour. Home of the 2014 Champions League final, this venue was seriously impressive. When our tour was over, we browsed the gift shop and watched Benfica Academy play outside until it was time for our surf lesson. Few of us had actually surfed before so it was certainly a learning curve, but our instructors were very helpful and eventually the boys got the hang of it. Absolutely shattered, we returned for downtime, dinner and bed.

On day four we woke up early to arrive at the rugby club for warm-ups. We comfortably beat local team Qashqui 71-0 – definitely good to get a win. After showers and changing we headed back to pack for the trip home. As it was one of our coach’s birthdays, we headed out for dinner that night and had a gift ceremony to finalise the tour. Departing early on Monday morning to various different places, the boys were happy to return home, but certainly thankful for the memories and camaraderie created in Portugal.