STU: MOANING RENNIE’S GOT SCRUM CHEEK
GLASGOW..8 EDINBURGH..16
EDINBURGH skipper Stuart McInally booted out claims his glory-clinching Gunners conned referee George Clancy.
Angry Warriors boss Dave Rennie accused the experienced Irish official of allowing the Murrayfield pack to scrummage illegally by shoving sideways instead of straight.
And ratty Rennie was convinced they duped Clancy by making it look as if the outmuscled home forwards were the offenders.
But after decisively and deservedly retaining the 1872 Cup, delighted hooker McInally said: “We were trying to scrum positively all through the game.
“And we got the reward for what we were trying to do. We were also rewarded for it when their prop was yellow carded.
“We work hard on scrumming square and pushing hard – we do a lot of that before matches – and we have never once spoken about stacking round a scrum.
“That’s two games against Glasgow in which the refs have given us the reward that we feel we deserved. I don’t want to say any more about what Rennie thinks – I will leave him to talk about that.”
Fuming Rennie said: “We weren’t happy with the way the scrums were reffed in the first match at Murrayfield.
“We sent some clips in to the referee authorities and they confirmed what Edinburgh were doing was illegal. It is supposed to be a pushing contest but they were walking round.
“It happened again in the first scrum here in the second game and again they were rewarded – so they’ll keep doing it.
“We still believe we have a good scrum but we need consistency around how this is being officiated.”
Despite Glasgow’s wretched festive season form Rennie stressed there’s no panic.
Ahead of Saturday’s Pro14 clash with Treviso in Italy he said: “What happened over the past week or two won’t change our selection policy.
“There won’t be a kneejerk reaction. With the European ties against Cardiff and Saracens coming up we will have to rest some of the guys to freshen them up.
“The Edinburgh defeats won’t be a psychological dent to our challenge. We are disappointed but it is not terminal.”
Jaco van der Walt’s two penalties against one by Adam Hastings had given Edinburgh the lead.
But the pivotal moment came when home prop Oli Kebble was sinbinned after being blamed by ref Clancy for a scrum collapse.
Almost immediately, McInally barrelled over for his team’s try. Van der Walt slotted the awkward conversion then a penalty.
Sub George Horne sniped over for a late Warriors touchdown.