Heavy defeat for the Green Machine
Carrick
Oban Lorne BT West Division 1
OBAN Lorne made the familiar trip to Maybole in Ayrshire on Saturday to take on West Division 1 leaders Carrick RFC.
The teams have not met so far this season with both scheduled home and away matches being postponed due to the weather.
For Oban Lorne it has been a frustrating season with the team languishing in 11th place in the table, propped up by only the very lowly Helensburgh who sit on -4 points.
This season has seen a much smaller pool of players for Oban Lorne Coach Corrie Louw to choose from than in recent years along with a huge backlog of fixtures, mainly due to the weather which has severely disrupted the team’s season thus far.
Healthy squad 87 18
Oban travelled with a squad of 17 players on Saturday but were without key individuals such as Tommy Sutherland, Connor Kerr, Jack Strachan, Richard MacKay, Lorne MacLachlan, Cammy Smith and David McLaughlin. Despite the missing players, a healthy squad was assembled for the game.
Carrick were full of confidence going in to Saturday’s game and fielded their strongest possible lineup. The school playing field in Maybole was swelled by a big crowd with the club celebrating their 40th Anniversary.
The home team ran Oban Lorne rampant in a one-sided first half as Carrick ran out convincing 49-6 leaders at halftime. Despite the heavy scorline Oban were competing well in the match and made the hosts work for every possible score.
Handsome
The second half fell more in Oban’s favour with the score still, however, favouring the hosts at 36-12 giving a final tally of a handsome 87-12 win.
Oban Coach Corrie Louw and captain Craig Wright were left happy with the overall performance despite the disappointing result that leaves the team 10 points adrift of 10th placed Cambuslang in the battle against the drop to Division 2.
Oban Lorne will hope to cut Cambuslang’s advantage down as the Green Machine welcome league strugglers and Argyll rivals Helensburgh to Glencruitten this Saturday.
Kick off is scheduled for 3pm at Glencruitten in what is a must-win game for Oban Lorne.