Dubai The Exiles under-19 team sent a squad of 23 players to Ireland last night for a challenging eight-day trip to Dublin.
Opponents lined up for the tourists include the first and second teams at the highly respected Castleknock College, who last season provided three members of Ireland's Under-19 international squad, and the traditionally strong Conglowes College.
Geoff Frost, who jointly coaches the Exiles team with Chris Conway, admitted his boys will have their work cut out. "If we can take one of the games then we'll be very pleased. It's all about giving a good account of ourselves as these matches will not be for the faint-hearted, we will have to play to our maximum and to the final whistle," he said.
The main aim of the tour, supported by a string of sponsors that include Dubai Duty Free, York Air Conditioning, Lloyds TSB, A&E, Byrne Plant, Leminar Coils and MacAir, is to provide the team with quality opposition in the hope of increasing the quality of play.
Frost added: "We felt the players needed to be subjected to a higher level of rugby. Out here, to be honest, it's quite low - that's not the fault of the players because they're just not playing enough. So this is a big chance to learn."
Further integration
Many of the squad members are already training with the senior Exiles squads. They will be further integrated and introduced to the Gulf and Emirates League rugby action after the Dublin tour. Another challenge for players will be to adopt to the much colder northern hemisphere conditions.
"We've put a lot of effort into preparing the players physically with work on fitness levels and skills. We expect it to be very cold, but we're used to the hard ground," Frost said.
The first game is on Friday against Castleknock's second XV.
