Stewartry 19 Cumnock 24

Cumnock u18’s travelled down to Castle Douglas with a seriously depleted squad for their latest league encounter and produced a horror show that Bela Lugosi would have been proud of.

From the kick off Cumnock huffed and puffed and while they had most of the possession their game was marred by uncharacteristic handling errors. The first score came as Cumnock attacked the Stewartry line but were looking for the killer offload rather than keeping it simple. With the ball like a hot potato the Stewartry winger picked the loose ball up on his 22 and ran through a couple of half-hearted tackles to score the first points for the home side.

With most of the game being played in the Stewartry half it was just a matter of time before Cumnock managed to break the home sides line. Stephen Robson eventually crossed the whitewash after good work put him in space for a powerful run and finish under the posts to give the Nock a 7 – 5 lead. However, Cumnock lacked any continuity of play and were now trying to force their game rather than going back to basics and suffered for it as the same Stewartry winger ran in a carbon copy of his first, again from deep in his own half, from another Cumnock mistake.

The Groundhog Day of a first half continued with missed lineouts, forward passes, handling errors and wrong decisions but for the first time in game Cumnock’s decision making from a 10 metre set piece penalty was spot on, much to the surprise of the coaches, for Jack Reilly to score under the posts to tie the score 12 – 12 at half time.

The coaches knew there was more in the Cumnock tank but it was how to release it that was the problem and the start of the second half did nothing to allay their fears as Strewartry crashed over unopposed from a 22 penalty to again take the lead 19 – 12.

But this seemed to be the turning point of the game as Cumnock’s forwards started to switch on and produced one turnover after another, and not giving the hosts the space they had in the first half. Again most of the game was being played in the Stewartry half and the Nock were at last stretching the home defence and twice thought they had scored only to be pulled back for previous infringements.

Eventually the Nock backs were hitting passes on the run and making yards but it was prop Stephen Robson that again crashed over to tie the score 19 – 19. With time running out Cumnock were again on the attack and pressing deep in the Stewartry half, scrum half Aidan Kerr dived over from short for Cumnock to take the lead for the first time in the game. Cumnock close the game out to win 24 – 19.

It was a disjointed game from the Cumnock perspective which made one of the coaches say he would rather be watching Coronation Street but within that there were a number of good individual performances, notably from hooker Glen Young, Gavin Gilliland, Andrew Harkiss who stepped up to prop and Jake Baird who played well in his first game of league rugby. But to win a game while playing ugly is not a bad thing and some of the play and effort reassured the coaches that we are moving in the right direction.

Team: Glen Young, Gavin Gilliland, Robbie McLaren, Calum Park, Michael Anderson, Gregor Aitken, Thomas Bowditch, Jack Reilly, Aidan Kerr, Stephen Robson, Andrew Harkiss, Jake Baird