Misfiring Watsonians
Watsonians were some way short of their own high standards at home to Boroughmuir Bears yesterday, but they were still strong enough to claim a 31-10 bonus-point win that strengthened their place at the top of the Super6 table.
Scrum-half Rory Brand scored the Myreside team’s first try after just a couple of minutes, and from that point there was only going to be
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one winner. The Bears might have put more pressure on the league leaders if they had opted to go for goal with a number of penalties, but instead they went for touch and failed to set up a scoring platform.
Edinburgh back-row Ben Muncaster scored a second try for Watsonians before the break, then in the second
half Dom Coetzer, Karl Main
and Angus Guthrie all touched down. Lee Millar added one conversion and Conor Eastgate was on target with two.
Jack Bergin opened the Bears’ account with a penalty and the stand-off also converted Jerry Blyth-Lafferty’s stoppage-time try.
“We weren’t on it today,” Watsonians coach Fergus Pringle said. “We made quite a few mistakes. We knew the battle at the breakdown was going to be tricky and we didn’t get much momentum – credit to them, I suppose – and it was a little bit scrappy.”
Boroughmuir coach Graham
Shiel accepted his team had been up against it. “It was a tough day and disappointing, clearly, but it is a big learning curve for us against a good outfit,” he said.
The Bears began the day in second place but slipped to third when the Ayrshire Bulls beat Stirling Wolves 64-20 in yesterday’s late match. Captain Blair Macpherson opened and concluded the scoring at Bridgehaugh for the Bulls, who are seven points behind Watsonians with a game in hand.
On Friday night, Heriot’s claimed a bonus point in a hard-fought 31-21 win at the Southern Knights. The match was in the balance at 24-21 to the Edinburgh club going into the final stages, but then a charge-down score by replacement centre Rob Kay made sure of the win. Stand-off Bruce Houston converted that try to end up with a five-out-offive record with the boot.
“To come away with five points at the Greenyards, which has not been a happy hunting ground for us, is massive,” Heriot’s coach Fin Gillies said after a result which keeps his team well in the hunt for a place in the play-offs. In the
Premiership, Currie Chieftains overwhelmed Heriot’s Blues by 50 points to 12 at Goldenacre to claim their third win in as many games. Edinburgh Accies, who had also won their first two matches, lost 12-13 to Hawick.
The Chieftains are the only team to have won all three games, although Hawick and Selkirk are also unbeaten, having drawn on matchday one. Selkirk won 29-10 at Musselburgh, and Glasgow Hawks won 31-29 at JedForest, whose losing bonus was their first point of the season. Champions Marr won 33-12 at GHA.