SCOTLAND ON SUNDAY REPORTS

Lewis thwarts Melrose



Published Date: 12 April 2009
By Richard Bath at The Greenyards
IT WAS back to the future time at the Greenyards yesterday. The sun beamed down on the packed stands, one of the legends of world rugby graced us with his presence, and seven of the eight teams in the quarter-finals came from Scotland. Even the pre-final veterans game was won by a group of Reivers' auld yins led by Adam Roxburgh, who beat an Ulster Oldies Select. This was rugby the way it used to be: bucolic, full-blooded, fun.
The home side played their part to the full, reaching their first final since 2005 and giving it their best shot in an epic encounter of fluctuating fortunes in which the result was in doubt until the final moments. Playing against a South African side that had a telling advantage in the shape of the tournament's star performer, Earl Lewis, Melrose's cohesion and commitment were powerful weapons, yet not powerful enough to claim their first Ladies Cup since 1998.

If the University of Johannesburg were largely dependent upon the raw speed of Lewis, a man who clearly takes after his namesake Carl, then Melrose put their faith in teamwork. In former Wallaby Sevens players James Lew and John Macey they had men with enough gas to burn the opposition, but they also had players like big John Dalziel and Scott White, quality footballers who added an altogether more subtle threat.

The final boiled down to an intriguing contest between Lewis and the entire home side. Seven times the lead changed hands, swinging this way and that until the teams found themselves at 21-21 deep into the second half. That's when Lewis' ability to strike from deep finally put paid to Melrose, the South African going all the way from his own 22 for the third time to complete a remarkable hat-trick of long-range tries. Melrose had come back time after time, but as they became ever more desperate gaps opened up for Lewis to put Jaco Snyman away for a 35-21 advantage that the visitors never surrendered as they became the fourth South African side in six years to triumph at Melrose.

If the final was memorable, so was the context. The showpiece was played shortly after a minute's clapping for the death this week of two rugby men, Hawick youngster Richard Wilkinson who died in a car crash, and Shawn McKay, the Brumbies lock who was knocked down and killed by a cop car in Durban. That minute was notable for the sad sight of Melrose's Aussie centre Lew in floods of tears – McKay was one of his closest friends from their days playing for Australia's sevens team. How he went out and played in his club's biggest game of the year immediately afterwards is anyone's guess.

Yet that was the only remotely discordant note on an afternoon that was also be remembered for the final bow for a legend of the game. Fijian maestro Waisale Serevi's face had adorned the posters and programme yet when the whistle went for the commencement of hostilities the sense that age had finally caught up with the great man was unmistakeable. Playing against Scottish domestic champions Ayr for Leeds Metropolitan University, for whom the 40-year-old has a honorary degree, he did his best to orchestrate proceedings and treated the crowd to small flashes of brilliance. But without the pace and goose-stepping guile which were once his hallmark, even his promptings weren't enough to light up an otherwise workaday side of students.

Although the inscription from Philippians 4:15 he wears on his wrist and boots ("I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me") is now palpably untrue, it was surely fitting that the finest sevens player the game has ever known bowed out at the home of the abbreviated game, the recipient of a sustained round of applause from the crowd. The great man was touched: "I don't regret anything in my life," he said as he left the pitch. "This is what rugby is all about: sometimes you win and sometimes you lose, but I thank God for being with me all the time through the 21 years of my rugby career. It was an honour just to play on this ground." It was a valedictory speech so dignified that Ned Haig would surely have wept tears of joy.

If Melrose carried the standard for Borders rugby yesterday, squeezing past a Heriot's side in which Jim Thomson was again outstanding, before blitzing Glasgow Hawks in the semi-final, the rest of the Borders sides experienced mixed fortunes. Jed-Forest, who took the field using the novel ploy of forsaking out-and-out pace in favour of an extra portion of pie-eating forwards, did what Jed tend to do these days and went out in their first game, well beaten by a Glasgow Hawks side for whom the nippy Sean Hunter was able to make hay.

To round off a forgettable day for the folk from Jedburgh, the visitors from Canada, Barrhaven Scottish – a side formed in 2004 in Ottowa when Barrhaven and Ottowa Scottish merged – were played off the park by a youthful Stirling County side, losing 42-10. It was a long was to come for 14 minutes of rugby, especially for their president, the former Jed player and Jethart callant Brian Lyall.

Kelso, for whom Ross Ford's brother Euan took a starring role, had looked sharp in their opening game, dispatching Edinburgh Accies with ease and generally looking like a slickly-drilled sevens side. In the second round they had no answer to the Lewis' pace or trademark chip-and-chase. Langholm also succumbed to the men from the High Veldt, losing in the first round.

Peebles were beaten by Gala in the first round, and the Netherdale men were in turn well-beaten by Watsonians in the next round, with speedy Samoan Tupu Saena and club skipper Jamie Blackwood, once of Melrose, doing the damage. Hawick scraped through by the odd point against West of Scotland but looked combative rather than inspired and were emphatically dispatched by Melrose in the next round. Kings of the Sevens leaders Selkirk fared even worse, losing 35-0 to Heriot's, for whom Scotland sevens player Jim Thomson once again looked like a class act.

Yet as the sun beat down, the try-count rocketed and an outstanding final unfolded, no-one much cared for such parochail concerns. This was rugby in the raw, sevens rugby as it was meant to be.

Melrose: J Dalziel, D Whiteford, G Dodds, W Wallace, S Wight, J Lew, J Macey, C Anderson, D Dodds.

University of Johannesburg: S Mafu, J Erasmus, R Van Deventer, C De Clerk, M Zock, D Badenhorst, E Van Tonder, B Godfrey, J Snyman, E Lewis.

This article was originally posted on 12-Apr-2009, 07:54 by Hugh Barrow.
Last updated by Hugh Barrow on 12-Apr-2009, 07:55.