This past Sunday brought the tail end of storm Eowyn’s finest with wind chills and rain blended with glacial temperatures, which the girls (coaches and I’m sure all spectators) felt right down to the bone. Conditions aside, the girls went on to play a thrilling 30 minutes of rugby, which impressed us all.

The game began with one of Hitchin’s few attacking opportunities and the girls flying out the gates in defence with Jess, Phoebe, and Kadi slamming the Hitchin girls to the ground and turning the ball over. This led to Harpenden’s first attack of the game. The ball landed in Poppy’s hands as she stormed (excuse the pun) down the pitch, dragging half of the Hithin team for 20m with her. Freya picks up the ball and makes a 25m dash for the first of many tries. Freya continued to convert her first try. — Harpenden 7 - 0 Hitchin

Hitchin kicked off again with a small bit of back-and-forth and in less than 90 seconds after the restart, Freya burst through 3 defenders scoring her second try of the day. Converting that as well! — Harpenden 14 - 0 Hitchin

Harpenden returned to their groove again with a flurry of our infamous quick ‘tap n’ go’ penalties. The girls then floated the ball between their hands down to the wing, where Sophie beat a couple of defenders flying down the far side wing. Poppy called for a few “red” balls as the girls relentlessly battered the Hitchin defence. Right after, Jess decides to run head-first into four defenders and barrel over for Harpendens third try. — Harpenden 19 - 0 Hitchin

Harpenden used their spine-shattering, ever-reliable crash balls to run through Phoebe and Jess, taking turns before Poppy orders for the ball to go through the hands all the way to Sophie, who sprints 40m down the blindside, darting past three defenders, once again, this time managing to convert her immense efforts into another 5 points for the girls! — Harpenden 24 - 0 Hitchin

The next episode of ‘Harpenden scores tries whilst freezing and slathered in the mud’ sees Kadi go for a 50+m sprint as she also crashes over the try line, between the posts. Followed by Phoebe making a 40m break and scoring a try, too (both brilliant efforts possibly inspired by Sophie’s try a few minutes earlier) — Harpenden 38 - 0 Hitchin

Harpenden were relentless and never resting as Margot, Kadi, Phoebe, Layla, and Freya took turns crashing through 70m of pitch, scattering Hitchin left, right and centre, only to be held up over the line. Hitchin then had a goal line drop out, landing straight in Eloise’s hands as they tried to fly up on her, only for them to give a penalty away, for Phoebe to barge through another three defenders to score. — Harpenden 43 - 0 Hitchin

Harpenden’s merciless streak continued thundered forward again. Margot ( clearly wanting to join the sprinters club that had formed at Harpenden RFC that day) joined in and scurried under the post, once again for the Harpenden girl's penultimate try of the day. — Harpenden 50 - 0 Hitchin.

The final play of the half had Harpenden girls continue to unleash their prowess over Hitchin. With the same level of pressure that Harpenden had applied for the last 30 minutes; finally saw Margot slip through defenders once again, for the final try of the match. — Harpenden 55 - 0 Hitchin

• Due to the morale of the Hitchin Girls and the mood of our Harpenden girls still shivering, we agreed with the Hitchin coaches to call it off, and due to the points difference in the game, Hitchin had no choice but to forfeit the game.