The NACRA Men’s U19 Rugby Championships is the premiere U19 Men’s Championships for the North American Caribbean Rugby Association. The members of NACRA U19 are USA Rugby South, Barbados, Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Mexico, Trinidad & Tobago, and Turks and Caicos Islands. We will profile each team leading up to the 2015 NACRA Men’s U19 Rugby Championships being held in Orlando, FL from July 11-18, 2015.
Mexico U19 will be entering into the 2015 NACRA Men’s U19 Rugby Championships as the returning champs and #1 ranked team in the tournament. Lead by Head coach, Ruben Duque, and team manager, Jesus Segovia, the Serpientes will be expecting to defend their NACRA Championships from last year.
Duque understands the difficulties that it takes to repeat as champions.
“It’s a big challenge and we know that all the teams come to the NACRA Championships much stronger and prepared each year, but at the same time this challenge is what we want and we need to go to the next level.”
Mexico will be looking to their veterans to guide the team back to the finals. They will be returning ten players from their 2014 team including, Bernardo Hernández and Andrés Muñoz at Flankers. Sebastian Díaz at 8-man. Scrumhalf, Andrés Rodríguez, Alejandro Barrón at Fly Half, Yeudiel Suro and Carlos Márquez at Wing. Álvaro López and Diego Gutiérrez at Center, and Max Martínez at Full Back.
The team is built around the players working as a collective. The philosophy that Duque has hard-wired into his players is that, “every player should do their work, all their work, but just their work.” A concept of building trust in each teammate, that serves to have the team work as a single, fluid unit.
For the team, it is a great opportunity to prove to ourselves that we can keep growing our game. At the same time we are capable of winning NACRA this year too
Mexico will be playing the USA South Red on Saturday, July 11th, at 10:00am EST. Catch the match on the Gift-Time Rugby Network
