London Youth Games Netball

We were extremely proud to have been crowned champions of Bromley earlier in the year. This meant we progressed to the largest youth competition in Europe (the London Youth Games!) We not only represented Balgowan but also the London Borough of Bromley against all the other champions from all the different London boroughs. On the 23rd March, we travelled via train and tube to Fairlop (North East London). Our team trained really hard over the last half term, doing early morning training sessions as well as after school sessions.

Group stages

There were 28 teams overall and 7 teams per group. Unfortunately, we lost our first game 5-1 against Barking and Dagenham but we held our heads up high and won the rest of our group games which meant we came second in our group. The top four teams in each group qualified for the best of 16.

Best of 16

There were 4 teams in each group and sadly we lost our first match to team Lambeth who were very good and experienced. However, we didn’t let that get in our way and continued to win our other two matches. We got to take an amazing photo with the Youth Games mascot before progressing to the next round.

Knockout rounds/ Quarter finals
After proceeding to the Quarter finals, we had our first knockout game and by the end of the match it was 4-4 so we were given extra time which lasted one minute. Since we got centre at the start, the other team (Merton) were given the ball and they scored. We were extremely unlucky but Merton did deserve to progress as well.
In the end we came fifth out of all of London! Something we are really proud of.