Behind the scenes with Wales under 16s and West Wales Raiders manager Peter Tiffin:

Last weekend myself Jon Ellis (Head Coach of West Wales Raiders RL) and Andrew Thorne (Assistant Coach West Wales Raiders RL) were all invited to Hull KR to be a part of their first home fixture of the 2016 super league
season. Hull Kingston Rovers (also known as Hull KR) is an English professional rugby league football club based in Hull, England. The club formed in 1882 and currently competes in Super League, we have recently
become a feeder club for Hull KR and look to work closely with them in the future.

After a great weekend away in Hull seeing Hull KR score a last minute try to draw against Castelford Tigers it was now our turn to face one of our new feeder sides. On a really cold Monday evening in west Wales we welcomed Swansea University to Trimsaran RFC where we took on each other in a controlled training game. Even though we classed this as a training game a good crowd came to see both sides in action, we also decided it would be a good call to have official referee James Jones to come down to make sure the both teams were corrected in any mistakes he deemed incorrect. With both sides bringing down a 20 man squad it was going to be interesting to see how the game unfolded as myself and the other coaching staff wanted to see all the boys in action for the first time this year.
With the game having 4 twenty minute periods we gave game time to everyone including a few under 16s players who we thought would benefit from the evenings game. As the final whistle blew the score line saw ourselves
scoring 13 tries and Swansea University one, it was decided as it was a training game that there would be no kicks at goal.

After the game both sets of staff had a long discussion and we shall now be doing a lot more with Swansea to help them with matters both off and on the pitch, we are really looking forward to continuing the partnership and
making sure that both sets of squads gain as much as possible from the link.

As the year was moving at such a quick pace it was now time to continue with preparations for our first origin game of the season.
Junior Origins in Wales sees West Wales take on East Wales at under 14s, 15s and 16s in a 3 match series, one home game, one away game and a final neutral one.

The first game will be at Ystrad Mynach on Sunday 28th February. The CCB Centre for Sporting Excellence in Ystrad Mynach, Caerphilly, is a Sports facility located in and run by Caerphilly County Borough Council, South
Wales.

This year will also be a first where under 16s from the East and West will take on each other for the title, this is also connected to Wales under 16s as all players wishing to be selected to represent their country this
season will have to be involved in their origin side.
Myself and Andrew Thorne will be involved in the first part of the Wales Under 16s selection process this Sunday at Stebonheath, we shall be holding a registration day where everyone who wishes to be involved this
year can come down to express their interest, if anyone reading this would like any more information regarding the origin series or registration day
please contact myself on 07772949956.