THE two super-powers of this club season will meet in the BT Cup Final at Murrayfield on 22nd April, after Ayr and Melrose ran out comfortable winners in their respective semi-final matches on Saturday afternoon.
Melrose might have finished 30 points ahead of Stirling at The Greenyards, but they did not have it all their own way, especially when falling behind early on to a Logan Trotter try and two penalties from Ross Jones – but they battled back to take a 19-11 lead into the break thanks to tries from Sam Pecqueur, Fraser Thomson and Russell Anderson, plus two conversions from Jason Baggott.
The hosts stretched clear during the second-half through further touch-downs from Nick Beavon (twice), Nyle Godsmark and Ruaridh Knott, against a solitary score for the visitors from Adam Sinclair.
“They put us under a lot of pressure in the first 20 minutes and that gave us a lot to worry about. We made a lot of mistakes that allowed them to do that,” said Melrose coach Rob Chrystie.
“But as the game wore on we were just a little more accurate and we kept the ball when there were opportunities there. We had to be patient. The boys are happy with the result but they know they can be better which is a great position to be in.”
Melrose host Currie next week in the semi-finals of the BT Premiership play-offs, while this defeat spells the end of the line for Stirling County this season – prompting head coach David Adamson to reflect afterwards that his team’s undoing was fairly symptomatic of how the campaign as a whole has gone.
“We started really well and went 11-0 up. The momentum was with us at that stage but we conceded a try shortly after the kick-off when we didn’t exit properly. It’s always frustrating from a coaching point of view when you have worked really hard to get to that position and it’s just down to sloppy play. We knew we had to be at the top of our game and unfortunately we just weren’t," he said.
On the other side of the country, Ayr hosted west coast rivals Glasgow Hawks in a clash which was bound to have an extra bite to it after it emerged during the build-up that visiting number eight Tommy Spinks is moving to Millbrae next season.
Spinks was stripped of the Hawks captaincy as a consequence, although he kept his place in the side and justified that decision as one of only a few players in the visiting ranks to emerge from this contest with credit.
Spinks, who was eventually shown a yellow card during the final ten minutes for pulling an opposition player down at a line-out (just a few moments after he had been warned for the same offence), battled hard in a losing cause when too many players around him were posted missing.
Ayr dominated the first half and raced into an 18-0 lead thanks to tries from Danny McCluskey and Grant Anderson, plus a conversion and two penalties from the excellent Frazier Climo.
Hawks rallied briefly on either side of half-time, but lacked the composure to really test Ayr’s well-drilled defence, and were restricted to a single Josh Henderson penalty. Climo then killed the game off as a contest when he slotted a penalty then converted his own try.
A late penalty try for Hawks after Ayr’s David Young was guilty of collapsing a driven line-out as it trundled over the white-wash provided little consolation to visiting head coach Finlay Gillies.
“We have no complaints today. We were second best to everything and you can’t beat Ayr without a line-out – if you can’t start a set play then you can’t execute anything. And we can’t continually look to Keir Gossman to step his way past six or seven people to get us out of trouble – we have to manufacture our own chances,” he said.
Gillies must take his side back to Millbrae next Saturday in the play-offs, and he says he draws confidence in the belief that his team have failed to really show what they are capable of in the three matches they have played against Ayr so far this season.
“They still don’t know what we are going to do because we really haven’t shown our hand yet. Ayr could defend one-up rugby all day and we are not going to break them down like that, so we have certain scenarios and certain patterns which we want to execute – but we can’t do that unless we start winning attacking line-outs,” he said.
Meanwhile, Murrayfield Wanderers will play Carrick in the final of the BT National Bowl, after they secured home victories over Gordonians and Hawick Harlequins, respectively; and Blairgowrie defeated Strathendrick while Portobello beat Moray to book their placed in the BT National Bowl final.
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