Good evening everyone,
With the game against Hawick YM called of at 9-30am Accies were again left without a game and are now 4 games behind in the league. The league season will now go on well into April or later if there are any more weather cancellation. Next weekend Accies were due to play in the first round of the SHE Shield but their opponents Langholm have withdrawn. Fortunately GHK are also without a game so it has been decided to play the Dave Gilmour Memorial match on the Friday evening. The match kicks off at Old Anniesland at
7-15pm. Supporters can join the players in the Clubhouse for the post match meal. These have to be pre-booked. If you wish to attend please advise me as soon as possible. There is a charge of £10.
This game always gets a large turnout so please put it in you diary.
Two members have advised me that they have spare tickets for 6 nations games. 2 for Italy v Scotland in Rome and two £50 tickets for the game on Sunday v France.
Call me on 0141 616 4056 if you are interested. First come first served
The 2nd Xv were fortunate enough to be playing down the coast at Ardrossan. The match report follows:
 
Ardrossan Accies 2nd XV 14 Glasgow Accies 2nd XV 9
 
Accies played a rearranged fixture against Ardrossan on Saturday an a surprisingly good surface considering the degree of frost overnight. This was only one of less than a handful of games played this weekend.
Ardrossan proved to be a surprisingly fit and resilient side and bore little resemblance to the one that visited New Anniesland earlier in the season. Their new Kiwi player coach has certainly made a huge difference to the whole Club. The degree of the desire to win and the tenacity of their defence had to be admired and they caught a ring rusty and under strength Accies by surprise. Accies had not played a game since the 12th of December while their opponents had played as recently as last Saturday.
In the final analysis Ardrossan probably deserved their win as they scored two tries to Accies three penalties. No matter Accies will be kicking themselves as this was a game in which they had numerous opportunities to score that they squandered and the 50:50 refereeing decisions and the bounce of the ball went against them. Three times in the last 15 minutes the referee turned down scores. The first two were when the ball was held on the line but the referee said that he could not be sure that a try had been scored. The third was when it seemed that Chris Johnstone had scored a clear cut try in the corner. The local touch judge put his flag up claiming that Chris had touched the corner flag, the referee said Chris had not touched it down. The latter was clearly wrong and the touch judge was not up on the change in the laws that allows a player to touch the corner flag in the act of scoring. Ali McLaren also had a 45 metre penalty ricochet off the crossbar.
In the final analysis Accies should not have needed these decisions as they had enough clear cut opportunities, especially in the second half, to have won several matches but too often the final pass went astray or overlaps were ignored by players holding on or cutting back into traffic and the chances were lost.
The first half was fairly even. Accies went into the lead 6-0 as a result of two Ali McLaren penalties. Ardrossan took the lead from an opportunist try. The ball came back too quickly from a ruck and was fielded by an Ardrossan flanker standing on the Accies side of the ruck. Accies claimed he was offside but the referee ignored them. Ali McLaren kicked another excellent penalty on the stroke of half time for a 9-7 lead.
The second half got off to a controversial start. Finbar Coghlin, a new player, came on as a replacement at half time and made his mark immediately with a scything tackle on the No. 10 that the referee adjudged to be late and gave him a yellow card. From the resulting penalty Ardrossan surged down the field and moved the ball wide. Accies defence was outnumbered and they scored a try in the corner. A superb conversion gave Ardrossan a 14-9 lead with 35 minutes to play.
Despite having most of the pressure in the second half Accies could not turn it into points thus losing after 13 wins but still picked up the losing bonus point.
The long layoff certainly didn't help but a bigger turnout at training in the coming weeks should help that.
The positives were that by and large Ali McLaren kicked effectively and Max Henderson gave a cameo display at fullback of fielding and running from defence although he is normally a winger. The poor wingers rarely got any really usable ball but when they did looked quite likely. The defence in the centre put in some cracking tackles but were caught out of alignment.
The forwards won a fair bit of the ball but were not aggressive enough when driving forward. The lineout was secure with Robin Bryant, Kenny Beattie and Chris Hall making some good catches and disrupting the opposition from time to time. Matt Franklin, normally a prop, playing out of position at hooker, had two good rumbustious runs up the middle of the field and Chris Wright put in some great tackles especially around the fringes. Finbar Coghlin when he returned to the field seemed to be a good back row prospect and a useful addition to the 2nd XV squad.
The team will learn a lot from this defeat and will certainly go on to win their league once the playing season gets back underway.

This article was posted on 30-Jan-2010, 21:30 by Hugh Barrow.