BT Premiership
Stirling County ............. 27 Melrose ........................ 40 Conceding three tries in the opening quarter of a match will make life difficult for any team.
But when the opposition is Melrose unbeaten in their five BT Premiership matches this season - it made Stirling County’s task akin to climbing Mount Everest with a fridge strapped to your back and your shoelaces tied together!
Even after they had managed to recover from that catastrophic start, County continued making life hard for themselves – the most obvious example being a loose line-out overthrow on their own line just before the break, which handed Melrose the bonus point.
“Nineteen points in the first 14 minutes, that was the story of the game,” shrugged defence coach Graeme Young. “To be fair to Melrose, they showed us why they are top of the league. They were ruthless in terms of both taking their opportunities and not giving anything away.
“We are getting stronger – but we need to tighten up on our penalties, make less mistakes and defend a little bit better. We need to make teams attack for longer to earn their tries. Melrose highlighted that for us today. Good teams show you where you need to get better.
“In terms of effort and application – fantastic. They hung in there when I think a few other teams would have fallen away at the end.”
The visitors grabbed the lead with a try in the third minute from Fraser Thomson, converted by Craig Jackson, and five minutes later Ally Miller dotted the ball down with a third try coming in 14 minutes by Sam Pecqueur. Jackson converted the latter and County were facing a nightmare at 19-0 down - and the first quarter not yet complete.
Matt Lamb got County on the scoresheet, converted by Jonny Hope, then the skipper added two penalties to bring Stirling to life.
Lamb blotted his copybook by picking up a yellow card for a late tackle but the home team dug deep and it looked like they were going to go the full 10 minutes of being a man down without losing a score until they shot themselves in the foot in the last play of the half, with a crazy overthrow to the tail of the line-out being gobbled up by Miller, who powered over from five yards out.
After a turgid start to the second half, Melrose eventually grabbed try number five Melrose Heriot’s Currie Chiefs Ayr G’gow Hawks STIRLING CO Marr W’sonians B’ghmuir Hawick
with their first moment of fluidity, when Ross McCann nipped in for his ninth try of the season.
Stirling bounced back when Hamilton Burr made good ground up the right touchline and Lewis Wynne strolled through a huge gap in midfield two quick phases later. But every time the home side gave themselves a chance of clawing their way back into the contest, they let Melrose stretch away again
Ruairidh Swan made a hash of gathering a speculative kick forward from Thomson and ended up knocking the ball back over the dead-ball line, and from the resultant scrum, Miller barged over on a number eight pick-up.
Stirling had collected bonus points for scoring four tries in every game this season up until now, and they gave themselves a chance of making it six from six when replacement wing Craig Robertson got Melrose turning with a quick tap penalty and then got back on his feet quickly enough to burrow over from a quick recycle.
With a two valuable league points now within their grasp, the home team tried valiantly to launch a sweeping attack from deep as the game moved into injury time, but Melrose spread out across the park and just swallowed up everything Stirling threw at them.
STIRLING COUNTY: P 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 W 6 4 4 4 3 3 2 2 1 0 D 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 L F A Pts 0 255 104 30 2 197 119 21 2 161 157 19 2 154 144 18 3 161 158 18 3 206 192 17 3 126 148 12 3 146 183 12 5 130 201 9 6 125 255 5 Referee: The John Graham Metals Man of the Match: