All change for North Midlands
May
NORTH Midlands will be forced to field a much-changed side for their County Championship Plate final against Northumberland at Alnwick on Saturday May 28.
North Midlands clinched promotion to the First Division of next season’s County Championship Bill Beaumont Cup having won the Second Division South title by beating Somerset and Devon earlier this month.
That was the prime objective for new head coach Scott Bemand, the former Harlequins, Leicester Tigers and Bath scrum-half, who will be forced to select virtually an entire new side to face Northumberland.
“The side that won promotion was comprised mainly of players from Championship club, but they will not be available this weekend,” Bemand said.
“They have just got to the end of a long season, they need a break from rugby and there are strict rest periods that they need to take.
“They made themselves available to play county rugby for a couple of weeks after the end of the Championship season and they have achieved what we set out to achieve this season by winning promotion.
“We set ourselves a target of winning promotion and we have done that. It’s an opportunity for the guys to have a bit of holiday now.
“We have told them that we will keep an eye on them next season when we will hopefully have the opportunity to get the county side together early than we could this season.”
Bemand and the North Midlands selectors have yet to name a squad for the trip to Alnwick but it is likely to be comprised mainly from players outside the National Leagues.
“We will be at the RLF North Midlands final at Stourbridge tonight when Worcestershire & Herefordshire play Greater Birmingham,” Bemand said.
“It’s an opportunity for those players to get into the senior county side so we will be looking at players from the likes of Luctonians, Malvern, Dudley Kingswinford, Droitwich and Newport, who won the North Midlands Cup last week, to face Northumberland.”
