THE SUNDAY HERALD REPORTS


Boroughmuir 20 / Glasgow Hawks 18
Lewis Stuart at Megggetland
Comment
THEY MAY be leading the league by a huge margin, but for the second week running, Boroughmuir were given a huge wake-up call by a team in the bottom half of the table. They had to come from behind to claim victory, to the annoyance of coach Eamon John, failed to collect the try bonus and were left hanging on at the end.

In the end, the result hinged on how the sides reacted to two sin binnings.

When Hawks were a man short, Allan Kelly being binned for killing a ruck on his own line, Boroughmuir took advantage to kick their penalty and score one of their three tries.

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When Cam Ward, the Edinburgh side's prop, was at last punished for a series of offences, Hawks slotted the penalty but suffered the indignity of conceding a try to short-handed opponents.

Afterwards John claimed he never thought his side would lose: "I knew they had a balanced side and that it would be difficult," said the coach.

"We're working hard to make sure nobody starts talking about the title or gets complacent, but with everything that's being written about us and the way other coaches are talking it is hard."

Certainly, with a 15 point lead in the Scottish Hydro Electric Premiership, Boroughmuir are handsomely placed to claim the title. But now they are in that position, every team is looking at them as the team to beat.

Hawks came close with a wholehearted, dynamic, committed performance would have been good enough to see off just about any other team in the league.

Perhaps with more belief, they might have finished a couple of points ahead instead of a couple behind but after a few weeks of struggle, belief was always going to be in short supply.

Not so for Boroughmuir even though the danger signals were there from the start when they conceded a penalty for diving into the first ruck and full-back Ruaraidh Jackson slotted the points for Hawks.

The big difference between Boroughmuir of this season and the last couple has been defence. Hawks had long periods of pressure but little to show for it in the first half, proving that the team that conceded one of the highest points totals last season has learned how to protect their own line.

After the early setback, it was time for Boroughmuir to show how they have gone through the season unbeaten with the forwards driving from a lineout. Elgan O'Donnell and Calum Cusiter both went close before the ball came back to fly-half Matt Cannon who had acres of space to slice through to the line on his own.

That should have settled Boroughmuir, but in fact seemed more to spur the Hawks who won a penalty, kicked for touch and drove the lineout almost to the home line.

They were held just short but the home side had to put so many people in to hold them that Jackson's cross kick left Kerr with all the space he could ask for to collect the ball and slide in for the try that, with Jackson's conversion, put the Glasgow side back into the lead.

Despite an O'Donnell penalty they held the lead to the break.

With the better of the swirling wind in the second half, and Kelly in the sin bin, Boroughmuir must have been confident about overcoming the deficit and only had to wait two minutes to do so.

Ben Fisher, the No8, being held over the line from a lineout drive, but then Martyn peeling off the scrum in a planned back row move to cross untouched. O'Donnell added the conversion.

Again the momentum of the match swung, with Hawks, now back to 15 men, taking control for long periods and when Ward, the home prop, found himself in the sin bin for a series of ruck and maul offences, they took advantage with Jackson's second penalty.

A man short, you would have expected Boroughmuir to consolidate, and perhaps it was a sense of complacency in the visiting defence that left a gap from a routine midfield scrum which allowed Cannon to put full-back Steven Ruddick into space before drawing the final man and putting Martyn in for his second try.

If they were starting to dream of a bonus point try, Hawks had other ideas, Stewart Smith cutting through and finding support on his outside for Jackson to again provide the score for Kerr, drawing the final man and putting the winger through.

Jackson could not add the conversion that would have levelled the scores and in a heartstopping final few minutes neither side could find the killer touch to change the score again.

An exciting match and more proof there is a lot of good stuff going on at club level with Boroughmuir leading the way.

Boroughmuir: S Ruddick; T Bury, A Hadden, E O'Donnell, R Couper; M Cannon, C Cusiter; F Lait, S Crombie, C Ward, F Pringle, G McCallum, O Brown, A Martyn, B Fisher. Replacements used: A McLean, C Costigan, E Matheson, G Cotterill, J White.

Glasgow Hawks: R Jackson; R Kerr, C Bruce, S Smith, S Gordon; I Noble, K Sinclair; G Strain, J McLay, G Morries, A Dale , J Clements, A McLay, J Fitzpatrick, M Sitch. Replacements used: M Smith, G Macfadyen, A Kelly, R Hamilton, S Murray.

Referee: G Knox (Greenock Wanderers).

This article was posted on 18-Nov-2007, 08:30 by Hugh Barrow.