2nd Round Cup Exit for Blair

Saturday 6th Feb 10, the Blairgowrie senior squad were in Cup action with a home tie against Grangemouth RFC in the second round of the Scottish Hydro Electric Bowl Competition. Grangemouth who are currently well placed in the league above Blairgowrie went into an early lead with a try in the first minute following some poor tackling by the home defence.

Despite this early setback Blairgowrie settled into the game with some good tackling from Fraser Bissett and Michael Black. With both sides making mistakes the only other scores in the first half came from the boot of Stepehen Souter who converted two penalties to make the half time score Blairgowrie 6 Grangemouth 7.

The second half proved to be much of the same with the scrum after scrum but it was Blairgowrie who went into the lead with another Stephen Souter penalty after Blairgowrie had put the visitors under some pressure inside their own 22 meter area. With game now flowing from end to end a try saving tackle by Ally Walker prevented the visitors scoring in the corner. With Grangemeouth reduced to 14 men after they had a player sin binned for a high tackle Blairgowrie played some of their best rugby of the afternoon with some good driving runs by back row forwards Kev Brown and Richie Duncan. Despite Blairgowrie’s efforts it was Grangemouth who went back into the lead having been awarded a dubious penalty after a Blairgowrie player had been deemed to handle the ball on the deck. With the game now finely balanced and both teams giving full commitment and with minutes of the match remaining the Grangemouth stand off who had a superb game chipped the ball over the home defence which he then collected and looked as if he was in for a try. However a great tackle by young Michael Simpson stopped the Grangemouth stand off in his tracks but somehow he managed to off load the ball out of the tackle for the supporting runner to score under the posts. Final score Blairgowrie 9 Grangemouth 17.

This was a commendable effort by the Blairgowrie who with a little bit of more luck could easily have come away with a shock result  against a team from a higher Division. We now wish Grangemouth all the best in the next round of the competition. Man of the match points were awarded as follows: Michael Black -1 point, Michael Simpson -2 points and Richie Duncan -3 points and Man of the Match.

Team; Ryan Walker, Rory Philip, Al Guild, Ewan Morrison, Mark Reddin, Robert Larsen, Richie Duncan, Kev Brown, John Cockburn, Gavin Wynd, Michael Black, Fraser Bissett, Ally Walker, Stephen Souter, Michael Simpson, Liam McLaren, Jake Cockburn, Alan Webster, Gordon Black.

This Saturday (13th) Blairgowrie travel to Pitlochry for their rearranged league match against Atholl RFC. There will be an early kick off to enable the players to watch the Scotland v. Wales international which kicks off at 2.30. There will be a bus going to Pitlochry so there will be a limited number of seats available for any spectators who wish to travel with the team. Team selection and leaving time on Saturday will be announced at training. Training at the J J Coupar Park at 7.00 on Tuesdays and Thursdays.