Club rugby: Watsonians show team spirit to take down Boroughmuir

Watsonians stand off Lee Millar believes that team spirit was key to his side's 13-5 home win over Boroughmuir that keeps the Myreside men in the running for a play-off spot and looks to have ruled Muir out of one.
Watsonians Lee Millar tries to break through the Boroughmuir defence. Pic: SNSWatsonians Lee Millar tries to break through the Boroughmuir defence. Pic: SNS
Watsonians Lee Millar tries to break through the Boroughmuir defence. Pic: SNS

The success was built on a gutsy defensive effort when Muir were desperate to find a way through and continue their recent upward trajectory.

“We work pretty hard on our defence and that’s the one part of our game I think we are getting better at,” said the 27-year-old, who booted eight points and created his side’s try. “We are tough to break down and there’s a buy-in from everyone. We all work hard for each other defensively.”

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Millar banged over a penalty in ten minutes then broke through three tackles – a rare defensive weakness by either side – to send Josh Rowland clear. Millar converted, then added a second penalty to give Sonians a 13-0 interval lead.

To their credit, Muir did everything they could to claw back the deficit, but all they could muster was a try from Rory Drummond.

“It was a game of two halves really,” said Millar, whose reliable boot has been a key factor in keeping Sonians in the top half of the table. “The wind was pretty strong in our favour in the first half and that let us play in the right areas. Then we probably tried to run it a bit too much in the second half when we should have kicked to the corners a little bit more.

“On the whole we’re happy to win – it was a tough game, a physical game and in a sense we cancelled each other out. So we take the win and move on.”

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In the away camp, coach Peter Wright was left ruing one blip in an otherwise outstanding defensive performance by his men.

“It was two teams that defensively played really well. We just lapsed one more time than they did and they got the try. Considering how we played defensively it was a poor try to give away,” said Wright.

Elsewhere, Heriot’s produced the performance of the day when they shrugged off dreadful conditions to topple leaders Ayr away from home.

Hooker Michael Liness was the star man, claiming all three tries, while Ross Jones had two conversions and two penalties to post a 25-7 success that edges the Goldenacre outfit closer to achieving their ambition of securing a top-two finish and a home play-off.

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Heriot’s remain third in the table with five games to play, six points behind Ayr who travel to face new leaders Melrose on Saturday.

Meanwhile, Currie Chieftains delivered the showing demanded by coach Ben Cairns in response to defeat at Hawick seven days earlier. Cairns was left fuming by that loss, but this time out his men got it right, reaching half time with a 33-0 lead on the way to a 47-17 victory over Stirling County at Malleny Park.

Joe Reynolds bagged three of the seven Chieftains tries, with Mike Vernel, Ben Robbins, Jamie Forbes and Kiran McDonald claiming the others, while Gregor Hunter booted six conversions.

There was no luck for basement side Edinburgh Accies, who went down 48-17 at home to Melrose.

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Michael Badenhorst had a try in each half for Accies – the first squaring matters after the visitors had scored the first of their eight tries after just three minutes. The hosts were also awarded a penalty try, but there was never any likelihood of recovering from a damaging period that allowed the Borderers to reach half time with a 29-5 lead.