Newcomers Malta came from 17-0 down to get their men’s Rugby Europe Trophy campaign for 2026/27 off to the best possible start on Saturday with an away win versus Denmark.
In round one of fixtures for this term, there were also away wins for last season’s champions Czechia and for Germany, who have come down from the Championship.
Malta have been promoted from the Conference after performing very well last year and have taken confidence from that into this higher standard six-team Trophy event this time around.
At the Erritsø Rugby Club in Fredericia, Denmark, on Saturday they played some really nice rugby in the second half to beat their hosts.
Denmark started very much the brighter though and two tries from centre Rasmus Kjeldgård Madum, with one converted by stand-off Benjamin Wiggins, put them 12-0 up early on.
It was 17-7 to the home side by half-time, their additional five points coming from a try by scrum-half Christian Kilsdal.
Malta, who had stand-off Robert Holloway yellow carded during the half, got on the scoreboard through a try from full-back John Connolly and converted by centre Christopher Dudman.
That score came just before the break and it meant that Malta had their tails up when the second half got going.
A try and a conversion from Dudman made it 17-14 after 42 minutes and then two minutes later the same man scored another five-pointer and suddenly Malta were 19-17 up.
Denmark were now powerless to Malta getting on - and staying on - the front foot now and, in the 52nd minute, their fourth try came via back-row Cameron Sultana. That score was converted by Dudman and it was 26-17.
Finn Graham, the Denmark hooker, was then yellow carded and although no points were scored when he was off, when it was 15 versus 15 again Dudman kicked a penalty and the sub Samuel Eden scored the clinching try. Dudman converted the clincher too to give himself 21 points on the day and his team a 36-17 win despite a late sin-binning for Sultana.
Czechia finished top last year as mentioned, but as promotion to the Championship was finalised after two years, Poland, who finished second in 2025/26, went up.
As a result, Czechia will be one of the teams to beat this year.
Sweden, who finished third last term, could not beat them at the weekend though they gave it a really good go at the Trelleborg Rugby Arena before going down 31-28 after a brilliant match.
Like Malta over in Denmark, Czechia had to battle back from behind in this one.
Sweden led 25-14 at half-time with their tries coming from hooker Armir Kozhani, full-back Mattias Nilsson and centre Axel Kalling-Smith in that period and scrum-half Jack Tatu Robertsson kicking 10 points.
During that 40 minutes, Czechia had centre Jindrich Kulhavy and winger Lukas Brada yellow carded, but they kept themselves in the game through tries from winger Adam Koblic and full-back Martin Cimprich with the latter also converting both.
With 14 men at the start of the second half as their second yellow continued, shorthanded Czechia cut the gap to 25-21 when scrum-half Matej Sehnal’s try was converted by Cimprich.
By the hour mark, Tatu Robertsson and Cimprich had swapped penalties to make it 28-24 to Sweden with 20 minutes to go.
The winning try came with 10 minutes remaining when Kulhavy scored and Cimprich converted. Czechia then held on 31-28 to leave the home fans in shock.
Following these two games mentioned, Malta are second on four points, Czechia are third on four points, Sweden are fourth on one point after earning a losing bonus point and Demark are fifth on no points.
Lithuania are bottom on no points with Germany top on five points after a professional display from the latter side at the Siauliai Rugby Academy Stadium.
Germany won 54-7 and were out of sight by half-time at 40-7 to the good.
The visiting team’s try scorers were hooker Darren Ferrar, centre Niklas Bechtel (2), winger Makonnen Amekuedi (2), back-row Anton Troch (2) and scrum-half Jan Piosik.
Stand-off Nikolai Klewinghaus-Hacker kicked six conversions and full-back Alexander Brosowski kicked one while a late yellow card for Bechtel could not spoil their day.
Lithuania had suffered a yellow card early in the game when winger Kestutis Karbauskas spent 10 minutes in the sin-bin while their only try of the game came from his fellow winger Emilis Mikalauskis with stand-off Ignas Keraminas converting it.
Round two of action in the Trophy takes place this coming weekend with Denmark-Czechia, Lithuania-Sweden and Malta-Germany the matches on the fixture list.
