Rugby's Perthshire Eagles so unlucky

May 16 2008

GWENT Dragons, Glasgow Warriors, Sale Sharks, Edinburgh Rugby and Perthshire Eagles enter-tained a crowd of 2000 at the Glasgow City 7s last Saturday.

In the first round, early missed chances by Perthshire allowed Sale Sharks to get into their stride.

Sale’s ability to dominate possession began to take its toll and their three quick tries just before half-time looked ominous.

The young Eagles’ battled with the superior physicality and power of the Sale full-time professionals, with Gav Bloice chasing and harrying everything and Tommy Simpson winning some close-quarter encounters.

Perthshire’s effort was rewarded by two tries in the second-half. The first a well-worked score, finished by Pete Saunders, the next from a driving maul that wouldn’t have looked out of place in a 15s game!

Perthshire met Hamilton in the first round of the Plate Competition, which proved to be a tight and highly entertaining match.

With the scores level with around three minutes to go, captain Ali Anderson’s men scored two unanswered tries to secure a place in the semi-final.

West of Scotland were next. The Eagles were now into their stride, with Pete Saunders and Marcus McAllister showing their Premier 1 opponents how to play this form of the game and the ways to release the lethal pace of Craig Assenti and Joe Hickman.

The final was against higher ranked Biggar. To the astonishment of the crowd, Perthshire struck first, second and third, with Tony McGuiness taking the game directly to his opponents every time.

Despite Biggar’s score on the whistle, the Eagles were in command at the half-time interval.

Early into the second-half, Saunders and McAllister were injured within seconds of each other and Biggar capitalised by scoring when the Eagles were down to six players.

Losing both play-makers at the same time was a major blow to Perthshire’s attack and despite solid midfield defending by Bryan Mitchell, the momentum swung Biggar’s way with the scoreline 20-20 at the final whistle.

The match went to extra-time and a golden score. With an early chance missed by Perthshire and a fumbled ball, Biggar went up the field to score to take the plate.

Despite the obvious disappointment, defeating Premier Division 1 and 2 clubs, scoring against a pro-team and good performances by individuals, there is optimism and belief, as well as injury concerns ahead of the Midland 7s competition at St Andrews tomorrow.