Young Victorians show their Power!

The Victorian Primary Schools Rugby League team has finished in third place behind powerhouse states Queensland and New South Wales at the National Primary Schools Exchange carnival held in Brisbane last week.

The Victorian's enjoyed some impressive wins over the likes of South Australia and traditional rugby league stronghold the A.C.T, however it was the scalp of the Northern Territory that caught everyone's eye. In order for the developing states to compete with Queensland and New South Wales, they are allowed to field a number of 13-year-olds in their teams.

While the Northern Territory fielded 13 over-age players, the Victorians chose to only select players who were 12-years-of-age, making the win over their northern rivals all the more impressive.

Storm Development High Performance Manager Paul Bramley was delighted with the team's performances.

"The last three years we've beaten South Australia and the A.C.T, but fallen short against the Northern Territory," said Bramley.

"We have been reasonably happy with past results, but our goal this year was to beat the Northern Territory."

Although comfortably beaten by New South Wales and Queensland, the scorelines were also an improvement on past tournaments.

"They normally beat us by 60, but this time we actually scored a try against New South Wales which was great. We look at those as achievements as well and use them to show we've made significant progress."

After defeating the A.C.T on day three of the carnival 10-5, the Victorians faced the boys from the capital again in the battle for third place on the final day.

And again they didn't disappoint, joining Queensland and New South Wales on the podium with a hard fought 15-8 win to put Victorian Junior Rugby League firmly on the map.

The progress of both junior and senior rugby league in Victoria continues to rise at an astonishing rate with Storm Development enjoying continued success with its state teams at the national carnivals.

"Our under-18's finished first in the affiliated states competition and were very good this year, and our senior program improved by finishing second in the affiliated states competition, which is up a place form last year," said Bramley.

SOURCE : VRL / NSWRL ACADEMY