SEVENS star Sam Faulkner insists his Cleobury side can hold their heads up high despite falling just short of the inaugural 24/Sevens national final.

Cleobury headed to Moseley Rugby Club, Birmingham, for the Midlands play-offs having enjoyed success at the Shropshire 7s, one of 32 local qualifier tournaments earlier this summer.

Run by England Rugby, 24/Sevens is a new community sevens series looking to grow rugby and increase participation among men and women in clubs.

While Cleobury were unable to book their name at the final having failed to come out on top in Birmingham, Faulkner, set to study at Nottingham Trent university in September, believes there is plenty more to come from his side.

“It was tough because we’re all still teenagers, and a lot of the other teams there were proper sevens teams who have been playing for plenty of years and training a lot harder than us,” he said.

"We’re mainly a 15s team in Cleobury, so to come here was just a great honour, we’ve felt like we’ve done the club and the badge proud.”

Later this month rugby sevens will make its Olympic Games debut in Rio with Team GB sending both a men’s and women’s team.

There was plenty of talent on show at Moseley on Sunday to suggest that rugby sevens is strong across the country at all levels of the game.

And while their 24/Sevens journey may have come to an end this time around for Cleobury, Faulkner was already looking forward to seeing the team grow going forwards.

"Seeing it at the Olympics will be great, people will be able to see what all the fuss is about and hopefully we’ll have loads of great players playing sevens because of it."

England Rugby 24/Sevens, is a new exciting grassroots sevens competition for all rugby teams, welcoming anyone who just wants to pick up a ball and run, for fun or glory. Visit www.englandrugby.com/24sevens to get involved.