Midweek inspiration puts Ayr on right track

Experience was the key for Ayr head coach Calum Forrester as his side bounced back from a mixed start to their BT Premiership title defence with an impressive victory over previously undefeated Currie Chieftains, writes Colin Renton.

In the run-up to Saturday’s encounter, Forrester had called upon several of his wily campaigners to deliver inspirational talks. And that clearly had the desired effect.

“We had said that, over the last couple of weeks, we had given Hawks and Melrose too much of a head start,” said Forrester, pictured, in reference to losses sustained in the previous two games of the campaign.

“Our preparation was really good during the week. Some of the senior guys have spoken really well – Grant Anderson and Scott Sutherland saying what it means to play for Ayr and win for Ayr – and it was great that they led from the front.”

From the outset, it was clear that Ayr were fully focused and, by half-time, they were already looking set to win, with skipper Pete Mccallum bagging two tries and Craig Gossman joining him on the score sheet, while Scott Lyle was on target with all three conversions as well as a penalty goal.

After the restart, the Chieftains scored unconverted tries for Ben Robbins, Harvey Elms and Jamie Forbes.

For a brief moment there was hope in the home camp, but the high error count was exemplified for coach Ben Cairns when the hosts missed a straightforward conversion of the final try then failed to find touch with a last-minute penalty, allowing Ayr to see out the win.

“That’s not the standards we set ourselves,” said Cairns. “We’ve talked a lot about setting our own performance levels – it’s not about the opposition, it’s about what we do from week to week, and that was miles off.”