WAITANGI, 5 Sept. - Canada wing Taylor Paris is the youngest player at Rugby World Cup 2011, but he has not asked senior teammates what he should expect.

Instead the 18-year-old, who celebrates his 19th birthday during the tournament, wants to learn for himself.

“I have been rooming with Adam Kleeberger, and I also speak to Ander Monro and Pat Riordan and they help me out, but I think there is only so much you can learn from other people telling you.

"I think the only real way to find out what these tournaments are like is just to experience it yourself."

Paris could replace Thretton Palamo as the youngest player to appear at a Rugby World Cup. Palamo of the USA was 19 years and eight days old when he came on as a substitute in a pool game against South Africa in 2007.

Paris turns 19 on October 6 and Canada will play their four Pool A matches against Tonga, France, Japan and New Zealand before then.

Record-breaking run

Paris, from Barrie, Ontario, already has a record-breaking habit.

After taking up rugby at high school five years ago, he quickly jumped from Ontario and national under-17 squads to become the youngest player to debut for the Canadian Sevens team, scoring a try in his first match as a 17-year-old at the Wellington Sevens event last year.

He then became the youngest player for the full Canadian team when he took the field against Belgium in November last year. In his second match, against Spain, he ran in two tries.

Despite that, Paris wasn't sure if he would be in New Zealand.

"I broke my hand about four months ago and so I wasn't sure how I would go. When I saw my name in the 50-man roster for the World Cup I was so excited.

"So when Kieran (Crowley, the Canadian coach) told me that I had made the final squad, it was just so, so exciting. This is the absolute pinnacle."

Bunnysitting duties

Paris does have one area of responsibility in the Canadian team. As the youngest member he has to carry with him, at all times, the team's stuffed moose mascot Captain Green.

But he rates that a much better task than one he was saddled with during his first international tour.

"I had this giant pink bunny rabbit with ears that were huge," he laughed.

"So we were going through the airport and the ears were sticking out of my bag and so the guy made me pull it out and go through a full security scan, probably thinking 'what's this guy doing with his huge pink bunny rabbit?' "

The Glendale Lady Raptors pounded the Austin Valkyries 32-12 to improve to 1-0 in Competitive Region Two Saturday.

Glendale led the entire match and 17-0 at halftime. It wasn’t until the game’s final minutes, with all Glendale subs made and a player lost to injury, leaving the Raptors with 14 on the field, that Austin got on the board with a pair of tries.

“We put our last three players on the field with still about 20 minutes left in the game,” said Glendale head coach Lisa Rosen.

“We wound up losing one of them and playing the last 20 minutes with only 14, and they pretty smartly were able to, when our fullback covered the blindside wing position, kick through.”

Glendale has a large contingent of new faces this fall, thus prompting a less structured a game than Rosen usually prefers, but it worked in the Raptors’ favor.  

“We went into it to constantly playing a real loose game plan to just see what would work with us, and we planned to tighten things up after that. For the most part, we made most of our line breaks by trying to play as much fast ball as possible and really trying to get as many people involved in the dynamic running game as possible,” she said.

“There was risk. We turned over a few more balls than we would have liked…but we did a pretty good job of penetrating the centers and then waiting until the subsequent phase to move it wide.”

Eagle forward Jillion Potter made her return from injury and played well, as did center Bethany Humphrey, two-try scorer Bethany Wilson and scrumhalf Sara Edwards.

With the bonus-point win, Glendale joins the St. Louis Sabres atop the CR2 table with five points.