The IRFU Volkswagen Mixed Tag at Belfast Harlequins RFC certainly moved up a notch on Thursday night as the teams played in their competition groups.
Premiership
Results
| Friesian Taggers | 19 – 06 | Tag My Pitch Up |
| Sheep Taggers | 14 – 11 | HashTags |
The Sheep Taggers caused a major upset with their win against top seeds HashTags, who will still have a major say in the league thanks to picking up a losing bonus.
Tag My Pitch Up were competitive for large parts of their game against Friesian Taggers but the reigning champions pulled clear with some clinical scores either side of half time.
Standings
| Team | P | W | D | PD | BP | PTS |
| Friesian Taggers | 1 | 1 | 0 | 13 | 0 | 4 |
| Sheep Taggers | 1 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 4 |
| HashTags | 1 | 0 | 0 | -3 | 1 | 1 |
| Tag My Pitch Up | 1 | 0 | 0 | -13 | 0 | 0 |
Championship
Results
| Galacticos | 11 – 11 | Space Cadets |
| Carlingford Knights | 16 – 16 | Taggers Bay |
Still all to play for in the championship with the four teams drawing in the first round in entertaining and feisty games.
I’m already looking forward to next week’s scraps in this one.
Standings
| Team | P | W | D | PD | BP | PTS |
| Carlingford Knights | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Galacticos | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Space Cadets | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Taggers Bay | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
Conference
Results
| Derryvolgie Halss | 08 – 13 | Flatliners |
| Runaways | 16 – 21 | Tag Heuers |
Another two entertaining game in the Conference as new teams Derryvolgie Halss and Runaways both stood up in some style.
The Runaways get our vote for Team of the Week for a match in which the more than doubled their total points scored to date and more than tripled their conversion rate after posting a 50% conversion rate on the night thanks to a hat trick from Sophie Matthews and a try from Brianna Gillen.
Standings
| Team | P | W | D | PD | BP | PTS |
| Flatliners | 1 | 1 | 0 | 5 | 0 | 4 |
| Tag Heures | 1 | 1 | 0 | 5 | 0 | 4 |
| Derryvolgie Halss | 1 | 0 | 0 | -5 | 1 | 1 |
| Runaways | 1 | 0 | 0 | -5 | 1 | 1 |
Leading Scorers
Just a quick look at the scorers this week as we’re starting to check the posted scorers against the team scores on a round by round basis. There may be some adjustments in the next week.
The women players continue to dominate the top of the table. Despite not playing this week, Joanne Orr (Friesian Taggers) hangs on to top spot though Rosie Murchan (Carlingford Knights) has drawn level on 12 tries, as has the highest place male scorer Mark Coughlin (Derryvolgie Halss).
The leading try scorers for the week were Sheep Taggers duo Connor Phillips and Andrew Simpson who both scored four tries but the leading points scorers were Rosie Murchan and Sophie Matthews (Runaways) who both claimed nine points from three tries each.
| PLAYER | TEAM | WK1 | WK2 | WK3 | WK4 | TOT |
| Joanne Orr | Friesian Taggers | 4 | 4 | 4 | 12 | |
| Rosie Murchan | Carlingford | 2 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 12 |
| Mark Coughlin | Derryvolgie | 4 | 5 | 2 | 1 | 12 |
| Suzie Rodgers | HashTags | 2 | 3 | 6 | 11 | |
| Kerry McIlwaine | Sheep Taggers | 1 | 6 | 3 | 10 | |
| Zahra Bonnar | Friesian Taggers | 3 | 5 | 2 | 10 | |
| Connor Phillips | Sheep Taggers | 2 | 4 | 4 | 10 | |
| Hannah Lewis | Hashtags | 3 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 9 |
| Hazel Jordan | Tag My Pitch Up | 3 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 9 |
| Benny Glendinning | Tag Heuers | 2 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 9 |
| Alexandra McIlwaine | Taggers Bay | 2 | 2 | 4 | 8 | |
| Imelda Friel | Space Cadets | 2 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 8 |
| Stephen Beasant | Galacticos | 1 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 8 |
| Katherine Boyd | Friesian Taggers | 1 | 3 | 3 | 7 | |
| Chris Gibson | Sheep Taggers | 3 | 4 | 7 | ||
| Conor Gilloway | Flatliners | 4 | 1 | 2 | 7 | |
| Jona Siri | Taggers Bay | 5 | 2 | 7 | ||
| Nathan Burns | Taggers Bay | 3 | 2 | 2 | 7 | |
| Paddy Quinn | Carlingford | 6 | 1 | 7 |
