EDINBURGH WILL AIM TO END ON HIGH

EDINBURGH head coach Richard Cockerill is desperate for his team to end the regular Guinness Pro14 season on a high by beating rivals Glasgow Warriors in their final game.

The capital coach doesn’t want to simply pick up a losing bonus point and limp into the end-of-season playoffs. Instead, he wants to beat Dave Rennie’s men in style to allow his team to enter the knockout stages with lots of confidence.

‘We need one point from that game but we want to win,’ said Cockerill. ‘That will put us into the play-offs and is the way we want to qualify.’

He praised his team for their eight-try rout of Scarlets that has put them that single point away from the play-offs.

‘That was a great win today,’ said Cockerill. ‘There are still parts of our performance that can be better but we did well.

‘The first 25 minutes, to get that far in front and score four tries was great for us and the perfect start. Overall, we played really positive rugby with ball in hand.

‘We scored some great tries, but we have to take that into the context of who we were playing against as they fielded a weakened team.

‘It wasn’t perfect but we got there with time to spare.

‘We will take all five points and can now look forward to the Glasgow game with confidence in two weeks’ time at Murrayfield.’

Scarlets head coach Wayne Pivac praised Edinburgh, although he admitted he expected more from his team.

‘Our young guys will learn a lot from what happened,’ said Pivac. ‘We were beaten by a better team whose defence was outstanding. We were never in that match and they deserved the win.’ By Rob Robertson