Junior School Swimming Gala

On Tuesday we saw our Junior School athletes battling it out to earn the title of “Year Group Champion” at the Junior School Swimming Gala. For our Primary 4s, this was their first time competing at a Gala and for our Primary 7s it was their last year at this event. The night was full of enthusiasm, support and success with many skills learned from their school lessons being performed to such high standards. Well done to all our swimmers for demonstrating the dedication and passion you have to such a time consuming yet rewarding sport. 

 

Football

The winning form continued for Senior Football on Tuesday when they were up against St Aloysius’ College. Another strong performance from the RGC senior boys side saw them progress to the semi-final of the SISFA cup. Gordon’s controlled the game well, moving the ball patiently and attacking with pace into the spaces when the opportunities arose. Having conceded from a couple of corner kicks in our last game, it was nice to secure our first goal from an attacking corner this time around. Two further goals, one at the end of the first half and one half way through the second half, ensured the boys finished out clear winners. A semi-final against Jordanhill awaits. 

 

Netball

It was a quiet week for Netball fixtures but we held our usual co-curricular and Saturday sessions this week where the girls prepared for their upcoming matches.

 

Girls Hockey

Saturday brought fantastic results for two of our hockey teams with P7s winning the Kilgraston Tournament and the 1st XI winning the North District Tournament. P7 played 4 games of 15 minutes winning against St Mary’s School from Melrose, Queen Victoria School from Dunblane and Kilgraston School. They drew with St George’s School, Edinburgh. The event was a great squad effort with all players equally involved and they secured another trophy in what has been a very successful year with coach Mrs Roberts. S1 were also at the Kilgraston tournament. They won against Kilgraston, drew with Morrisons and lost to St Mary's and Queen Victoria School.

It was a very close contest for the 1st XI in the North District Tournament with the outcome only being decided in the final match against Cults Academy. The team secured 4 wins and 2 draws, winning the tournament on goal difference. Miss Howie was delighted to see how hard the girls worked all morning and they played some fantastic hockey. Our 2nd XI were in the same tournament and finished joint 4th with Aberdeen Grammar and Albyn. Their best results were drawing with St Margaret’s and Albyn. All 15 players played really well and gave 100%. 

P5-7 enjoyed another session on the grass and it was great to see 25 pupils out practising their skills and enjoying small-sided games.

 

Boys Hockey

The Boys 1st XI were playing against Aberdeen Grammar on Saturday. The overall performance was excellent and they successfully controlled the game from the opening minute. It didn't take long to open the scoring and we were a few goals up by the end of the first half. The second half went similarly but the boys would have been disappointed not to keep a clean sheet as Grammar scored a consolation goal to make the score at full time 7-1.

 

Boys Rugby

On Wednesday the 1st XV travelled to Glasgow to play in the Hutchesons 7’s tournament. The team had a very steep learning curve, resulting in our best performance and closest game being against Kelvinside, the eventual tournament winners.Losing our first game to High School of Glasgow 40-12, the lads reflected well and went out to lose narrowly to Kelvinside 24-14, having been drawn at 14-14 at the half. The boys grafted well against Glasgow Academy to secure a 28-5 win. Finally fatigue and an increasing error count defensively saw us lose to St Columbus 14-26. It was a good day of learning and an enjoyable tournament to be part of.

Several visiting teams travelled to Countesswells on Saturday morning to create an exciting fixture list of triangular tournaments. Mr Hall was delighted with his P6 team, commenting they gave ‘an outstanding overall performance’ in their matches against High School of Dundee and Morrison’s Academy. They managed to edge out a well organised Dundee team and physically matched a mixed P6/7 Morrisons squad to win both matches.

It was a very even match in the end for the S1Bs against Morrison’s Academy, losing by just 4 points. The boys struggled to find their flow in the first half and made a lot of forced errors. In the second half they worked more as a team and clawed some points back to narrowly miss out. There were some really great performances, and lots to take back to training this week.

S1A started very slowly versus Mackie Rugby Club. We lost the ball in contact and offloads and struggled to tackle low and firm. However RGC did improve at the end of the game and scored a couple of well worked tries but the win went to the stronger Mackie side. The team then played against Aberdeen Grammar Rugby Club and showed a big improvement in terms of ball retention but concentration and aggression still wavered in defence. RGC scored a few team tries by moving the ball through the hands well, delighting the crowd of parents on the touch line. The final was a narrow loss to RGC with Mr Buckley optimistically stating that had the game been five minutes longer we might have won!

S2A had 2 x 30 min games with Aberdeen Grammar and Mackie. Our attack in both games was really good; strong, quick and wide when it was required. Our defence held up well but has certainly given us things to work on. The team was delighted to win both matches. S2B drew with Morrisons in a very exciting and well contested game.

The S3 match away to Morrison’s Academy was sadly cancelled due to frozen pitches so the boys came to Countesswells instead to continue with their training.

1st XV travelled to The Oriam in Edinburgh on Saturday to compete in the Scottish Rugby X Conference Tournament where the new tackle height experimental law variation was being trialled. This was a great chance for the boys to be part of the consultation and test ourselves against some top schools and clubs. We started with two back to back games against Strathallan and North Edinburgh Vikings. The first game was a really good battle and tightly contested game and the latter being fairly one sided for our stronger team. We then had a large break and on our return to the pitch unfortunately lost to Boroughmuir. The big break got to us and we started far too slowly; the game got away from us and we couldn’t quite claw it back in time. We finished the day with a very close game against Stewart’s Melville where we narrowly lost 7-5 but the game was there for the taking as there were a couple of missed opportunities we should have taken. Overall this was a really good day out and experience for all the lads. They adapted well to the law trials both offensively and defensively as the day went on and it showed in their performances. It will be interesting to see how the game could develop in the very near future!

 

P1-P4 Multi Sports 

P1-4 had a wonderful morning at Countesswells on Saturday during their first multi-sport session. For many of our pupils, this was their first experience of a Saturday at Countesswells and they were delighted to be a part of the large College community that celebrates sport every week at our beautiful playing fields. The pupils had an exciting introduction to ‘Football Allstars’ and ‘Rugby Champs’. These skill challenges and assault courses made for great fun in the sunshine before joining in with some small sided games. The morning was a great success thanks to our 17 Senior Sports Assistants; these pupils acted as positive sporting role models for our youngest pupils. We look forward to welcoming the P1-4 group back again this Saturday

 

Team of the Week

Our RGC TOTW for this week are all of our JS P4-7 overall year group podium winners from the Junior School Swimming Gala on Tuesday. All of the boys and girls put in a great effort, with some outstanding individual performances and school records being broken along the way.

Primary 4 Boys:
1st - Elliot C
2nd - Robert S
3rd - Muna U
 

Primary 4 Girls:
1st - Abigail C
2nd - Elizabeth L
3rd - Isabella M
 

Primary 5 Boys:
1st - Graeme I
2nd - Aled L
3rd - David G & Oliver C

Primary 5 Girls:
1st - Abi L
2nd - Kate O
3rd - Andrea M & Sarah H

Primary 6 Boys:
1st - Harry F
2nd - Joshua W
3rd - Max D
 

Primary 6 Girls:
1st - Pippa C
2nd - Esmay A
3rd - Sarah F
 

Primary 7 Boys:
1st - Daniel R
2nd - Cameron J
3rd - Jack B

Primary 7 Girls:
1st - Katy R
2nd - Frida M
3rd - Lucia S

 

Sporting Achievements from Outside School

Congratulations to the pupils across the school on their following achievements this week:

• All the swimmers who took part and worked extremely hard at the SASA North Swim meet. Some swimming for the first time, many smashing personal best times and others flying and hitting those SNAGS2023 times.

• Joe R (S5) who represented one of the two U18 Scottish Rugby squads on Sunday against Wales U18s. Joe was part of the Blues side taking at the DAM Stadium in Edinburgh.

• Lewys B (S4) who represented Caledonia U16 at the Scottish Rugby festival in Stirling

• Ava (S4) and Zara (S3) who played in their Aberdeen District Netball Performance squads who had double success against Dundee. Ava and Zara both had strong performances and continue to show great progress.