Following the RFU’s decision to allow club second teams into the main English Club Championship we find ourselves in the newly created Counties 2 Midlands West (North) league. Designed by the RFU to reduce travel, we find ourselves with 'local derbies' with the likes of Newport (Salop) 2nd XV, Oswestry RFC, Market Drayton RFC, Luctonians 3rd XV, Clee Hill RFC, Cleobury Mortimer RFC, and this coming weekend rivals Bridgnorth Bulls 2nd XV.

“The restructuring hasn't worked out that well for us, we have drawn the short straw on the increased travel side as we travel across most of Shropshire. We do still have the more local trips to Burntwood, Veseyans, Handsworth and of course to our friends at Aldridge,” commented Head Coach Jon Arch.

"We have had a good preseason training programme which the whole playing squad have fully bought into. We have maintained most of our squad from last season, we have unfortunately lost Aidan Butler and Ronan Yeo who have both moved for work, with Dillon Doherty also out with double ankle surgery for the 2022/2023 season. We have been able to attract a number of quality new players to the club over the summer but these will take some time to settle in,” added Jon. “We have also added Birdie (Tom Bird) to the coaching team, who will focus on the Forwards, and are still looking to add a Backs Coach to the support team.”

Harborne 1st XV delivered an impressive performance in beating Spartans 1st XV from the league above 22 - 0 on Saturday. This was the third of our pre-season games in which mixed squads lost to Daventry 38-5 before an improved performance against Alcester ended with a 28-24 victory despite finishing with just 13 men.

“The performance against Spartans was very good; we could have scored 2 or 3 more tries to be honest, and even with making changes throughout as we looked at options, we were able to maintain the structure in both attack and defence - to shut any side out to zero is a superb effort. The players have now set the minimum standards for themselves for the season ahead. We have used nearly 40 players across the 3 games which bodes well for both the 1st XV and the 2nd XV.”

“It's another season of the unknowns thanks to the league restructuring. I expect Burntwood to be strong again, and I know Veseyans have recruited well, but with the likes of Lucs, Newport and Bridgnorth we could easily be playing some of the contracted first XV squad members so its definately going to be a challenging season ahead.”

"As a club we have obvious goals for the season; these are based more around playing some great rugby at 1st XV and 2nd XV level and having some fun both on and off the pitch. To me a successful season would be for us to be better than we were last season, transitioning new players into the 1st XV, and attracting more new players to Harborne Rugby Club," added Jon.

Harborne 1st XV Kick off the RFU Counties 2 Midlands West (North) league season this saturday with a challenging away trip to Bridgnorth Bulls 2nd XV, 3.00pm Kick Off