Revenge is sweet for Ayr rugby
Six points better than last term
Ayr ................... 48
Watsonians ..... 12 Revenge, as they say, and has been quoted often in this column, is a dish best served cold.
Not that Millbrae was anything like tropical for the final regular season BT Premiership clash between Ayr and Watsonian FC – to give them their Sunday name – but damp and dreich enough to make that aphorism apt.
Ayr were never in trouble against the side who had turned them over at Myreside and in so doing had probably cost Ayr a second successive top spot in the BT Premiership season regular season.
Melrose will overtake current leaders Ayr to win the league provided they beat Stirling County in their final league encounter, rescheduled for March 11.
Keith Young scampered over for the opening try for Watsonians after five minutes with Ewan Scott converting but that was the only movement on the visitors’ side of the scoreboard for the next hour while in that time Ayr racked up 31 points.
The first came after Lewis Anderson ripped away from a driving maul and bounced off would- be tacklers on a 20 yard burst to the line for what was a memorable try for the young hooker.
Frazier Climo converted from wide out then the next came by hassling the Watsonians backs into a guddle, Ross Curle nicked the fumble and Steven Longwell and Pete McCallum combined to put Danny McCluskey over.
Ayr were in control of line- out and set piece and from a juddering scrum inside the Watsonians’ twenty two, with their back row shadowing McCallum, the No8 deftly slipped the ball to David Armstrong for the scrum half to equally deftly elude the defence for try number three.
The bonus point came after a rollicking midfield thrust took Ayr to the Watsonians twenty two from where Blair Macpherson rightly backed himself to go in for a fine solo effort.
That took Ayr into the break at 26- 7 ahead and with the bonus in the bag and the best that can be said for Watsonians is that they did have the occasional flurry which usually resulted in the ball being either turned over or spilled.
Between scores Ayr had been workmanlike and in control but when they turned on the style, they were in a class well above their opponents as could be seen in the build- up and execution of McCluskey’s second try which ended with winger selling an outrageous dummy on his way to touchdown.
Twenty four points in the red, it was credit to Watsonians that they snaffled the ball from an Ayr attack which was leading to a certain try and scrambled downfield for prop Martin Christie to claim their second try but Ayr hit back four minutes later with a beauty.
It was a superb team score originating with McCallum, Longwell and Will Bordill then carried on by Archie Russell before Grant Anderson burst into the line to offload to Jamie Bova for an outstanding score.
Climo ghosted between two hapless Watsonians to pluck an intercept out of the air and finish off from the twenty two and the scoring ended with another blistering combination move ending with Bova’s second which brightened the gloom which was descending on Millbrae as the cloud thickened.
A fine performance to conclude the regular BT Premiership campaign, a long haul which has garnered 75 league points, remarkably six more than last season’s table topping performance.