THE HERALD REPORTS

Beattie takes it in good faith after missing out on final
John Beattie was on a mission from God as his West of Scotland side sought to become the first ever from the third division to reach the Scottish Cup final at Burnbrae on Saturday.

As the founder members of the SRU largely out-muscled the team that - formed just a decade ago from GHK and Beattie's home club Glasgow Accies - has become the dominant force in the city's rugby scene, the faith was almost rewarded against Hawks.

"They're an amazing bunch. We talk about friendship and we did Psalm 25:19 which is all about how if a man wants to know what he is like he doesn't look in the mirror he looks at his friends," said Beattie of his charges after the game.

Since he had also left spectators scratching their heads with the same biblical quotation when interviewed by the match announcer ahead of kick off, it was clearly a message he was keen to relay.

Yet when I typed "Psalm 25:19" into the internet yesterday to double check the exact wording of what John was on about, it came up with a slightly different phrase.

"Consider how many are my foes and with what violent hatred they hate me," it read.

Ah well, the big fella never was one to burden himself with too much research when he was a marvellously entertaining columnist for this publication, but maybe it is all down to the translation. Let's face it, for a rugby player both versions are useful to keep in mind.

Perhaps the best barometer of friendship and enmity was the West second XV who - newly crowned champions of their own league - kept a constant stream of lager-fuelled encouragement and barracking throughout the 80 minutes.

Rory Kerr, who made his name with West before going on to Hawks and Scotland honours, received particular attention - but the white booted winger contributed hugely to an occasion graced by as good a crowd as seen at a Glasgow club game for some time.

Such was the home side's vigour that Beattie - perhaps fearful they would somehow rile the three-time national champions and four-times previous cup finalists, to greater effort - was regularly to be seen trying to calm them down.

Yet for much of the game it was the Hawks forwards who were cowed - so much so that Davie Wilson, their head coach, admitted afterwards he has much to do to prepare for the onslaught that will come from second division Edinburgh Accies in the final.

He was also rightly generous in his praise of the hosts and said: "They may not appreciate me saying this, but I think the winners today in terms of guts, determination and such-like are maybe West. It was their day in many respects."

What many West supporters were less appreciative of was their substantial scrummage advantage being negated late on after a third Hawks front-row forward was withdrawn when their pack was very much on top and West, with the wind at their backs, tried to recover from a 19-5 half-time deficit.

West started with real fury, scoring the opening try when prop Elliot McLaren drove over in three minutes. But doubt set in as Hawks played some lovely stuff and created tries for John Fitzpatrick, Steve Gordon and Niall Caddell.

Mike Adamson missed his third conversion attempt as well as two penalties either side of half-time, though, and that was all the encouragement West's pack needed.

Such was their dominance, suspicion was understandable when the scrums went uncontested, and Beattie gestured angrily at Wilson on the touchline, but had cooled by the end.

"Heat of the moment and I believe him. I reacted but I totally trust him," he said, having heard Wilson's explanation regarding the injuries suffered.

Gordon Bulloch, the West hooker, who like Beattie is a Scotland and Lions forward, albeit of more recent vintage, seemed a tad more sceptical.

"That's twice this year we've played sides from higher divisions in the cup and they've gone to uncontested scrums," he said. "We knew we could compete up front and I don't think there was one scrum ball they could do anything off."

The scrummage de-powering came after West's efforts finally earned them the try that got them back within a score as Nick Caddell followed up on Bulloch's initial breenge seven minutes from time.

For Hawks there was no way of making the lineouts, mauls or rucks uncontested, however, and deep in injury time West managed to level the try count when Scott MacKechnie's quality delivery put Ben Wright into the left corner.

The angle was too much for Fraser Sinclair to cope with, however and so the relieved Hawks were spared a period of extra time which, unlike at kick off, they would have gone into as clear second favourites.

12:01am today



By KEVIN FERRIE

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This article was posted on 23-Apr-2007, 06:52 by Hugh Barrow.