2009 Interfaculty Cup

 

21st January 2009 saw the 12th annual Interfaculty Cup competition fiercely contested in the leafy Cheshire setting of the Alsager campus.

With more than 300 students from Manchester in attendance, hoping to wrest the Cup from their Cheshire rivals, this legendary annual event certainly rewarded its spectators with plenty of thrills and spills for their efforts.
Whilst Cheshire have dominated the competition since the early years, Manchester clubs have been closing the gap on their Cheshire cousins and were hoping to finally lift the cup after conceding a narrow defeat in 2008.
Football dominated the proceedings with 5 men’s matches and 1 ladies match.  The pick of the bunch was the men’s 1st team match. MMU Cheshire has sat in the Premier League for 5 years, but suffered relegation twice in the last 3 years and this was going to be a difficult match. The game was tight with Cheshire taking a 1-0 lead but Manchester had plenty of chances to pull level. In the dying seconds of the match Manchester equalised and it looked like the final result would be a draw. With 12 seconds to go Cheshire kicked off and booted the ball up field, the Cheshire left wing won the ball skipped past the right back and just managed to cross from the by-line into the box. The Cheshire captain Martin Fray rose and headed the ball onto the inside of the near post and scored the winning goal with 4 seconds left on the match official’s watch.
Cheshire won 3 of the men’s football matches and there were 2 draws. MMU Cheshire Ladies football, the only Premiership team across the university going into 2009/10, narrowly beat Manchester 3-2.

 Rugby, of both codes, had always been hard fought between the two sides. Manchester was the winning men’s rugby union side in 2008 and Cheshire were out for revenge. The match quickly moved up to 5-5 with tries for both sides and then the team cancelled each other out for the rest of the match by not scoring a single more point. The women’s match was much more one-sided with a strong Cheshire team, who play much higher in the BUCS competition, proving too much for Manchester. Even with some players switching sides at half time, this didn’t stop the flow of points to Cheshire. In the other code there were fast and hard tackles aplenty with some players coming out with blood injuries, strapping themselves up and throwing themselves back into the fray. Cheshire took the early lead and, 3 tries up at halftime, looked to be heading for victory. However Manchester came back strong in the second half and eventually lost by only 2 points 16-14.
The basketball results on the day, despite the best efforts of the opposing teams, were as predicted. Manchester’s men winning by 24 points in the 1st match and 30 in the 2nd match, and Cheshire’s women winning by 32 points.

Cheshire suffered a convincing defeat in the men’s waterpolo match 17-4 with Manchester’s more experienced players proving too good for them. The ladies however put up much more of a fight eventually conceding a hard-fought but narrow 5-6 defeat.

Tennis entered the Interfaculty cup for the first time in a number of years with both sites re-entering into BUCS competitions this year. The game was played on Cheshire’s outdoor courts, a precursor to the coming cup match between the 2 teams. MMU Cheshire drew first blood in these 2 encounters winning 6-4 in matches.
 
Cricket is a summer sport but the clash was of the indoor variety up in Manchester before the teams hopped on a bus back down to Cheshire. The match was the closest game many had ever played in and it took a maiden over (something unheard of in indoor cricket) from Manchester in the last over of the game to secure victory by 7 runs.
The last sporting clashes were in netball. Four matches took place over the day and tipped to be a close and high tempered game was the 1st team match. Manchester sit one league higher than their rivals, however Cheshire were destroying their league and clearly playing at a level lower than their talents deserved. The match did not disappoint and was closely contested right up until the final quarter when Cheshire secured victory by 4 points. Overall Cheshire won the netball competition winning 3 and out of the 4 games.
As the matches came to an end spectators and competitors made their way to the infamous Brandies Bar for sustenance and refreshments and waited for the results to be compiled and the presentations to begin.
 
Leanne Cardill, MMUnion Vice-President (Cheshire) compared the presentation with the Student Activities Officer Cheshire and Sports and Societies officer Manchester reading the scores out to cheers and celebrations from each winning side. Leanne then invited MMU Head of Sport James Crowley up to present the cup to the winning side. In the final analysis Manchester won 8 matches, Cheshire won 12 matches and 3 matches were drawn – MMU Cheshire had retained the Interfaculty Cup!
 
Following the presentation clubs from both sides got together and enjoyed socials, games, and Brandies Dick’s Show until Manchester students headed back up North later that evening.

 

 
 

 

 

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Published: 25 Feb 2009 09:21 , Last updated: 02 Apr 2009 13:06