Crucial clash in Borders
Perthshire head coach Alan Clark has tagged this weekend’s trip to St Boswells“crucial”for their hopes of a top-half finish.
The Eagles sit seventh in the Tennent’s National League Division 3 ahead of making the long trek to the Borders on Saturday.
Clark’s men defeated their hosts earlier in the season but the Perth coaching team know that will count for little if a positive result isn’t picked up this time around.
“We should go in as favourites given the league positions and the game we had last time,”Clark told the Perthshire Advertiser.
“St Boswells went up to Orkney a couple of weeks ago and won - and not many teams do that. On their day they can put out a very strong team.
“But they, perhaps more than anyone, struggle with availability of players. They don’t have a lot of lads from St Boswells who play for them.
“We took around 50 off them last time in what was a fairly comprehensive win at the North Inch. It was the first time in a few years we’d beaten them.
“It’s a crucial game for us and we can’t sugar-coat these things anymore.
“This is a game where, if we win, we’ll be in a really good position to go into the last few games challenging for a top six place.
“If we lose, we’re going in there looking at a possibility of relegation.”
Shire’s momentum was stalled last weekend after a 29-13 defeat against Ardrossan Accies at the North Inch.
The Perth men held a 13-5 half-time lead before the game slipped away in the second half, with struggles in the set-piece a key downfall.
Clark held his hands up for not changing things and said:“It was quite tight, probably for the first half and 10 minutes into the second half.
“To be honest, we couldn’t really win any set-piece ball in the second half and our scrum was going backwards at a rate of knots.
“The lineout was misfiring and that allowed Ardrossan to get a foothold in the game.
“Every time we had a scrum they got a penalty, which went to touch and they won the ball again.
“It was a tough old last half hour but, right until that point, we were in the game and we were looking good at 13-5 at half-time.
“We didn’t react to anything in the game in terms of changing things up. We were almost a little bit shell-shocked.
“So we need to hold our hands up as a coaching team. This week there has been reflections on the game and what the plan is moving forward.”
The Shire squad came through the bruising encounter without any serious injury concerns for this weekend’s fixture.
Providing a squad update, Clark added:“We took a couple of knocks and bumps on Saturday and a few were seeing the physio on Tuesday night.
“There is a wee concern over Shaun Barton who took a bit of a knock to his ankle and had to come off. But on the whole our availability is looking good.”