Announced as a new addition to the Tigers Family last week, the Wheelchair Rugby CluTeam will play in the UK league and join forces with the existing Marauders club to play as Leicester Tigers in European competition.
They kicked off a two-day 'friendly' campaign on September 21 and 22 at the Emirates Arena in Glasgow with a 51-34 victory over hosts Caledonian Crushers.
They followed it up with a 53-21 win against Ulster Barbarians, the Irish development squad, before going down to their only defeat of the weekend to the Ireland national team, the Gaelic Warriors. The Warriors remained undefeated through the tournament to lift the Crusher Cup.
“The Irish were simply awesome,” says Tigers captain James Price.
The newly-formed Tigers, who will compete in Division Two of the Coloplast Super Series, returned to action on the Sunday against Division One teams the North Wales Dragons and the North East Bulls.
Tigers produced their most solid performance of the weekend to defeat the Dragons before closing their campaign with a thrilling victory over the Bulls.
Tigers led for most of the match but when the Bulls came back to within a point it mad for a thrilling finale. But the Tigers team held on to finish the weekend on a high.
Price said: “We felt very satisfied with the results and, after seven hours of tough rugby, to finish in second place to an outstanding Irish team.
“Massive thanks to Crushers for organising an outstanding tournament. We’ll be back next year for the trophy!”
