MILLFIELD lifted the De La Salle Cup with a hard-fought 8-0 victory in the final of St Joseph’s College’s 26th National Schools Rugby Festival, on Sunday.

The team scored with a drop goal and the only try of the game to see off John Fisher School, in what was a tight encounter.

St Joseph’s got off to a great start on day one by winning all of their games, along with Merchiston, Dulwich and the eventual winners.

This enabled them to progress to Sunday’s Cup competition along with Brighton, Bedford, QEGS and John Fisher.

Day two proved that the two sides who had been put together on the first day were ultimately going to be the two strongest sides in the whole festival, with John Fisher of Purley winning Cup group A and Millfield winning Cup group B.

Having started the festival in such fine form, host side St Jo’s sadly were unable to repeat their form on the second day.

A close loss to John Fisher was followed by a win against QEGS but they couldn’t quite maintain their form and lost their final game 7-3 to Merchiston of Edinburgh.

The festival continues to be the highlight of the schoolboy rugby calendar bringing together – this year, schools from England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.

It is a credit to the festival that the likes of Tony Diprose of Harlequins and England coach Stuart Lancaster rightly recognise this weekend as a vital part of finding the next generation of international and premiership players.

Indeed Chris Robshaw and Jordan Turner-Hall of Harlequins, Johnathan Joseph of London Irish and Christian Wade of Wasps have all played in Ipswich and no doubt this festival will continue to deliver.

The Plate final was an extremely close match between RGS High Wycombe and Stamford School decided by two tries to one. Final score 10-5.

Try of the tournament went to Tom Whiteley of Millfield and the Nick Duncombe Player of the Tournament award went to Sam Denham of Millfield.