Ayr vs Stew Mel, 8/10/05

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Squad

The Stewart's Melville FP RFC team to play Ayr RFC on Saturday at Millbrae, kick off 3 pm, is:

Ten of the team that started against Stirling County last week will start against Ayr, with the five vacant slots being filled by Peter Jorgensen, Andrew Easson, Pete McLean, Neil Malloy and James Constable. Of those missing, Craig Joiner and Ben Leathes are unavailable and the rest are injured.

This will be James Constable's debut for the 1st XV, while Euan Clark will be playing his 50th 1st XV game. It's also worth noting that Peter Jorgensen, released to us from the Edinburgh Gunners for the first time this season, will be the only one of the team who played for us the last time we were in Division 1.

If any supporters would like a lift to Ayr on the bus, this will leave Inverleith at 11 am on Saturday. Directions to Millbrae can otherwise be found here. Either way, please do your best to come along to cheer the boys on - and give Dalgy his dumps.

Riggers' Review

It might seem strange to many that conceding more points than the week before leads to a more positive mindset, but, in all the gloom and despair that the final scoreboard at Millbrae produced, there were just hints that it's not over - not by a long way. Out of it all, somewhere, somehow, I feel a team has emerged. A team that were up against it from the kick off, who gave everything that they had for the jersey and each other and who, by the time we returned home to Inverleith, had formed a bond (albeit drink induced) which should carry them on in good stead for the remainder of the season.

With a team sheet showing nine changes (a number positional) from the team which started against Stirling, we knew we were going to be up against it. Take out players of the quality of Ross Rennie, Craig Joiner, Matt Dey, Richard Borthwick, Shaun McMurchy and Ben Leathes (to name but six), then add in the fact that Gareth Flockhart, Struan Samson, Jed Gordon and Zane Gardiner are also injured, and you'll see that we were behind the 8 ball to start with. To focus on these guys who are missing would be doing a disservice to those who came in - they can play a bit, too - but, in a cutthroat season in Premier 1, we need our top team on the pitch at every opportunity. Hopefully many of them will be back in contention for this weekend.

In many respects our job would have been made easier if Ayr hadn't had a worse result the previous week against Heriot's than we'd had at Bridgehaugh. No chance of complacency in the home ranks helping us out. We started the game defending and held out quite comfortably for the first ten minutes, until we conceded a bizarre score. I say bizarre because no one other than Paul Burke, the Ayr back row forward who scored it, will know how he escaped from a ruck on our ten metre line to race under the posts without having to avoid any defenders.

We then had a good period where we nicked a couple of lineouts, took one against the head in the scrum, made a couple of line breaks and had some pressure in the Ayr 22. Sam had already kicked a penalty by this stage and, if (there's that word again!) we had managed to get over the line and score, the pressure would have been on Ayr. After being held up over the line, we managed to contrive to lose possession out wide after the resulting scrum; a couple of kicks down field by Ayr, a couple of pieces of desperate defence in our 22 and, suddenly, instead of 10-7 up, we're 14-3 down. Backs to the wall stuff again. The rest of the first half was spent trying to contain Ayr and, in doing so, we conceded a couple of penalties to go in at the break 20-6 adrift.

The second half started promisingly, and you felt, if we could get the first score, then we could be in with a chance of getting something from the game. When Phil Hendry crashed over after a back row move, suddenly the supporters believed we could do something. As has, however, been the case against Heriot's and Biggar, we then made the cardinal sin of conceding a score more or less from kick off, when a delicate kick over our defence saw the Ayr centre Lavelle gather and score under the posts. We then made the cardinal sin that we have made against Boroughmuir and Stirling County. Losing one score is bad enough, but we then had a ten minute period where we couldn't get any possession and the effects of playing against such a big team were beginning to take their toll. The other Ayr centre is taller and bigger than any of our forwards. Unfortunately, he's not the biggest in their team. It was a battering we were taking.

The team never gave up, however, and still looked to move the ball at every opportunity. We never quite managed to get Dave McCall into space so he could use his pace, but, after getting into the corner, we managed to engineer a try by captain Paul Wharakura, who had led from the front all afternoon and deserved the score. When Sam Hendry converted to score his 300th 1st XV point for the club, a 41-18 defeat would have been tough to take, but probably a fair reflection. Ayr were not finished, however, and, after a lineout catch in the corner, we were once more driven over our own line. This was a disappointing facet of our game the whole day. We need to get better at sacking these lineouts and bringing the drive to a halt. Something to work on this week, then ... plus a few other things!

We return to Inverleith next Saturday to await the visit of Melrose, with Graham Shiel coming up against his old team. The day will see Paul Wharakura's 50th game for the Club, and a fantastic servant he has been in the two and a bit seasons he has been here. It would be fitting to reward Paul with a victory to help celebrate this milestone - and another try from Paul would be good, too. The evening continues at the club with our Race Night, and, with both 1st and 2nd XVs at home, please try and get down, support the team and have a great day out.

Riggers

Stew Mel Stats

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