Tennent's Bowl
The restructuring of the Tennent's Bowl competition this season was all about ensuring that finals day at Murrayfield would not be the preserve of the premiership clubs.
Today that thinking is translated into reality in the final of the Bowl which brings together the national division six champions Carnoustie FP, and division three side Perthshire in the all-Tayside clash.
For Carnoustie, reaching the final of the Bowl follows on from the success of winning the national league division seven and six titles in successive seasons, and before that the Midlands district championship.
However, Carnoustie realise that they will be facing opponents who play their rugby three divisions higher up the national league.
''That will make us underdogs and that will suit us. But some of our players have played in higher leagues,'' said Carnoustie coach Barry Simmons, who will be looking to his Midlands District Union representative players to provide the backbone of experience against Perthshire.
They included wings Derek Jamieson and Grant Langlands, stand-off Ian McFarlane and flanker Scott Purdon. There is also experience at hooker in Derek Craig who played for Caledonia Reds' Under 18 side.
Perthshire, coached by Bruce Beckett, head of PE at Perth Academy, will be hoping that their late season form surge can continue into the final. ''We had a difficult start to the season, but have played well since Christmas,'' said Beckett, who has promised that his side will play an open game at Murrayfield.
''We believe that our strength is out wide and so we will want to move the ball to the wings.'' Beckett has at full back Martin Hose, the former Scottish Schools cap and a useful attacking player. Skipper Allan Brown who will lead the side from outside centre, will be a key player for Perthshire in opening up space for the pace of New Zealander Sean Judkin on the wing. Directing the game from stand-off will be Rod McRae whose partner is scrum half Andy Ritchie.
Perthshire clearly will start as favourites, but if Carnoutie can mount a strong challenge then who knows they might just bowl their opponents out in the final innings.
Carnoustie FP - I Macrae; D Jamieson, K Wynyard, A Hay, G Langlands; I McFarlane, D Christie; I Ross, D Craig, S Kingston, B Low, P Christie, S Purdorn, M Peacock (captain), G Dickson. Replacements C Rankin, A Collins, J Murphy, G Leith, S Souter, D Murray.
Perthshire - M Hose; S Judkins, A Brown (captain), F Oliver, S Davies; R Macrae, A Ritchie; I Forsyth, S Hodge, J Whyte, K Price, A Chappel, D Schofield, S Martin, J Leiper. Replacements B Ockenden, R Armstrong, J McDonald, P Murdoch, G Watson, G Guthrie.
Referee M Hall (Boroughmuir).
ALAN LORIMER
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article