North Midlands pair Kidderminster Carolians and Tenbury will have the chance to win silverware on Saturday March 16.
Both are through to the Midlands finals of RFU Cups with Kidderminster travelling to Midlands Two West (South) rivals Kenilworth in the Midlands Intermediate Cup final and Tenbury hosting Mellish from Nottingham in the Midlands Junior Vase final.
The regional finals are, in effect, the national quarter-finals of the respective competitions with the winners progressing to the national semi-finals where they will face their counterparts from the North.
Kidderminster trip to Kenilworth will give them the chance to avenge two league defeats by their Warwickshire hosts this season, the most recent of them only last Saturday.
That match was a bruising affair which left its mark on Kidderminster’s squad although head coach Ian Bletcher believes the incentive of a Twickenham final will help to heal the wounds.
“We have only used 26 players in the first team this season and we took a number of knocks in what was a physically demanding game last week,” Bletcher said.
“The mood in the squad is very good. We lost there last week and didn’t quite perform to our best but there are a number of reasons for us to be cheerful.”
Bletcher, a former Birmingham and Dudley Kingswinford hooker, is in his third stint as coach at Kidderminster and enjoying working with a team of talented young coaches – Andy McLellan, Rhys Pritchard and Jake Evetts.
“It’s good to be back at Kidderminster and it’s great to be working with some of the best young coaches in the county,” Bletcher said.
Last week’s defeat probably scuppered Kidderminster’s hopes of winning promotion but Bletcher hopes that a cup run will provide adequate compensation.
“We are through to the final of the North Midlands Shield at the end of the season so we have got that to look forward to but I think if you gave the players a preference between the league and the Intermediate Cup, I think they would say the cup,” Bletcher said.
“We are very fortunate to be a well-supported club. We have a very loyal group of ex-players who follow the club and their support really does give the lads a boost.
“We have a double-decker bus going to Kenilworth so they are going to make a day of it and hopefully they will have a win to celebrate.”
Tenbury’s Midlands Junior Vase final will be the biggest match staged at Palmer’s Meadow and will give the club another cause for celebration in their 60th anniversary season.
Tenbury overcame near-neighbours Clee Hill in the semi-finals in front of a big crowd and hope that the possibility of landing a trophy will attract similar support this weekend.
Tenbury will have the chance to add more silverware next week when they host Chaddesley Corbett in their final league match of the season where a win would secure the Midlands Five West (North) title.
That represents a dramatic turnaround in fortunes for Tenbury who were relegated last season with just three league wins but who have yet to be beaten on the pitch this term. Their only ‘defeat’ came when they conceded a North Midlands Vase match at Ross on Wye because of their commitments in the RFU Junior Vase.