Ulster Schools Cup

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The Ulster Schools Challenge Cup is an annual competition involving schools affiliated to the Ulster Branch of the Irish Rugby Football Union. The Schools Cup has the distinction of being the world's second oldest rugby competition having been competed for every year since 1876. The trophy itself is a three handled silver cup with a plinth mounted on a large shield.

The Schools Cup

[edit] Format

The Schools Cup was reformatted in 2003/04. Previously teams defeated in the first round would enter the Subsidiary Shield competition, teams losing in later rounds would find their season over. All entrants, except those who drew byes, entered in the first round of the competition. It was felt that this could lead to significant mismatches; the reformatting sought to avoid this and to extend the amount of meaningful rugby played by school teams.

The first round was changed to act as a qualifying stage for weaker teams and first round losers entered a new Schools Trophy competition.

The bulk of the teams entered the competition in the second round where they were joined by the first round quailfiers. Teams losing at this stage are entered into another new competition, the Schools Bowl.

In the third round, four seeded teams entered the fray. Third round losers entered the Subsidiary Shield, renamed the Schools Shield. The Subsidiary Shield was first introduced in 1971. It did not have its own trophy until 1980 when the Headmaster of Grosvenor High School and then Ulster Branch President Ken Reid presented The Grosvenor Shield.

The remaining teams contest for the Schools Cup proper, the semi finals and final of which are played at Ravenhill, the Ulster branch HQ and home of the Ulster side.

The competition was changed again in 2005/06. This season the first round was a round robin competition involving three teams. The winner from this joined eleven other teams in the second round. The six winners from this round will join ten more teams in the third round; the losers compete for the Schools Trophy.

The eight third round winners will proceed to the fourth round where they will be joined by eight seeded teams. The third round losers compete for the Schools Bowl.

The fourth round proceeds as per the old third round.

The increased number of competitions means that schools which are very unlikely to win the main competition have a realistic opportunity to win a trophy.

[edit] History

The first winners in 1876 were The Royal School, Armagh, who also became the first team to retain the trophy, winning again in 1877, and the first school to do the hat-trick, winning from 1879-81. By a quirk of fate in 1977, when a new shield was required as the original had no more room to record the winners, The Royal School won it again, thus claiming pride of place at the top of the shield again.

The first final to be played at Ravenhill was in 1924. Before that most finals were played at The Royal Ulster Agricultural Society grounds at Balmoral, and one final was even played at the Linfield Football Club ground at Windsor Park.^[1]

By far the most successful schools have been Methodist College Belfast [32], Royal Belfast Academical Institution [29] and Campbell College [22]. There is a significant gap between these three and the next three, Coleraine Academical Institution [9 wins, last in 1992] The Royal School, Armagh [also 9 wins, last in 2004] and Portora Royal [7 wins, last in 1942]. Including these six, a total of seventeen schools have won the trophy at least once.

Although not widely known outside of Ireland, the Schools Cup is enormously important within Ulster rugby. With no school 1st XV league, the Schools Cup is effectively the only competitive rugby played by the senior school teams. As a result it is taken very seriously, particularly by the more successful schools. It is not unusual for a Cup squad to have two or three coaches and a physio. They will have trained intensively, usually from the summer and may even have been given dietary advice to optimise their performance.

Given this level of commitment it is hardly surprising that there is also a certain amount of skulduggery. Some schools openly film matches involving potential rivals and rumours of player poaching, particularly from smaller schools with less chance of success, have abounded for years. Coaches have also been known to contact the coach of the previous opponents of the next team they play and ask for analysis.

The initial rounds of the Schools Cup will routinely attract two to three hundred spectators, more if one or both of the schools playing are viewed as contenders. The semi-finals and finals have crowds of up to three or four thousand, more if it was a local derby match. Whilst the Belfast schools have dominated the competition and a Methody v Inst. final will probably be the most keenly contested, a town versus country match is a strong tradition of the cup. The St. Patrick's Day final is also televised live on BBC Northern Ireland, complete with half-time punditry and post-match interviews.

[edit] Performance by School

School	Outright Titles	Shared Titles	Runners-Up	Total Finals
Methodist College Belfast	30	2	24	56
Royal Belfast Academical Institution	29	4	18	51
Campbell College	22	4	11	37
Coleraine Academical Institution	9	0	24	33
The Royal School, Armagh	9	0	3	12
Portora Royal School	6	1	5	12
Bangor Grammar School	5	0	4	9
Rainey Endowed School	2	1	2	5
Ballymena Academy	2	0	6	8
Foyle College	2	0	2	4
Belfast Royal Academy	1	3	4	8
Regent House, Newtownards	1	1	1	3
Royal School Dungannon	1	0	4	5
Annadale Grammar School	1	0	1	2
Ballyclare High School	1	0	0	1
Belfast Boys' Model	1	0	0	1
Grosvenor High School	1	0	0	1
Wallace High School	0	0	4	4
Derry Academy	0	0	2	2
Dalriada School	0	0	1	1
Galway Grammar School	0	0	1	1
Londonderry College	0	0	1	1
Lurgan College	0	0	1	1
Omagh Academy	0	0	1	1

[edit] Finals

Note: Prior to 1942 drawn finals were always replayed. Then in 1942 it was decided if the final is drawn, a replay would only take place if both schools agreed. It has since become the rule that replays are never held and the trophy is automatically shared. Shares occurred in 1942, 53, 54, 60, 62, 63, 64 & 96.