Match Report

We welcomed back a number of regular faces to the team for the game against Fullerians though a few more were unavailable for the fixture which meant we had to shuffle things around especially in the scrumhalf and fly half positions. Not that it mattered too much as the team put a sterling performance in to secure victory, a victory that pushes us ever closer to promotion.

The first-half saw us produce a dominant display of rugby in which we came out on top 17 – 0. The forwards on the whole consistently arrived and contested at the breakdown giving Greg Webster (who made the transition from flanker to scrumhalf) and our backs quick ball to attack and open up the Fullerians defence. It was such combinations of play that lead to our first try within a couple of minutes of play. Quick hands in the backs resulted in Tim Mackay receiving the ball out on the right wing who went over to score unchallenged and score his first for the 1XV. Dean Butchart followed up with the conversion. 0 – 7.

Despite an untested scrumhalf / fly half combination Greg Webster and Joe Wilburn stepped up to the plate every time and kept play moving forward. Our rugby was free flowing for the most part and even though at times we let ourselves get too over excited take nothing away it was good rugby. Dean Butchart extended his point’s tally with a penalty mid-way through the half and followed this up with a second conversion minutes later as a result of our second try scored by Ben Collins who appeared totally shocked to have collected the ball from our lineout and to have scored which also was his first for the 1st XV. 0 – 17. Soon after we lost one of players to the sin-bin and had to see out the half with 14 players. Fullerians as expected came back at us but for the most part were unable to cross the gain line despite playing some good running rugby. Our defence held firm and we were able to see out the first-half without conceding any points.

We were still a player down for a few minutes in the second-half and so our start was a bit cagey. Fullerians reminded us that the game itself was far from over and they certainly made us work in defence, however, our defence (as it has been for the majority of the season) held firm. Once we found ourselves back to our full compliment of 15 we were able to push forward, however, the first period of the half remained closely contested with opportunities few and far between for both sides.

With about 20 minutes we to go we found some rhythm again in our attacking play and created 4 good opportunities. We opted to convert two of our chances into direct points which eventually gave us a 23 – 0 lead and despite coming close with our chances we could not turn the pressure into points and eventually saw out the game 0 – 23. (RB)

Team: Brujic Menzies Roxburgh Pearse (Linn) Collins Robson (Bowman) Mathieson White (cap) Webster WilburnParillion Butchart Fraser Pickup Mackay sub Tee.
Referee: Mr.D.Daly NMSRFR