Perthshire dumped in Dumfries

Mar 4 2011 Perthshire Advertiser Friday

Dumfries26

Perthshire3

THIS was a very frustrating afternoon for the Shire players and supporters as the reshuffled team lost to Dumfries Saints for the second time this season.

Perthshire are languishing in second bottom spot in the league and, with Dunfermline having a convincing win against Musselburgh on Saturday, Shire will find themselves anchored to the bottom unless they can regain the form and enthusiasm which has disappeared of late.

Defeat at the hands of Dunfermline on Saturday is unthinkable but unless everyone starts pulling in the same direction and players commit themselves through to the end of the season then Perthshire Rugby will be staring at relegation into whatever structure the SRU’s working party will devise for next season.

From the kick-off, Dumfries camped themselves in Shire’s territory and within five minutes indiscipline cost them three points from a penalty. But a wonderful strike from Jack Steele evened the score and it looked as though Shire would put up a fight against their sprightly opponents.

Another penalty followed for Dumfries as they upped their work rate and every time their strong running backs got the ball they caused panic in the Shire defence.

Hiddleston set off on a run for Dumfries and they cut through Shire’s defence like a knife through butter for the first try of the game.

Dumfries were dominating the scrums and taking good ball from the line out and were much quicker in thought and action than any of the Eagles players and as a result Shire were on the back foot for all of the game.

Hiddleston slotted another penalty just before half time and worse was to follow as Mackinnon was yellow carded.

Dumfries took full advantage as they powered over from a line out only for the referee to judge that the ball had been held up and Shire escaped into half time trailing 3 -14 and with 14 men on the pitch.

Dumfries were enjoying so much possession that they were being very careless with it and dropped passes in scoring positions robbed them of a number of certain tries.

The one-sided match continued as Dumfries missed several penalty kicks and even knocked on when they took a quick one attempting to score a try. Mackinnon, Hood and Bloice were trying their hardest to gee up their team mates but still Dumfries were by far the better team moving the ball at pace all over the pitch while Shire’s only tactic seemed to be to get the ball and then run into players as hard as they could and invariably lost the ball in contact.

Winger Sloan managed to run untouched through several attempted tackles as Dumfries scored their second try and this was followed by another mesmerising move which had Shire at sixes and sevens and Hiddleston slid through for the final score before the referee ended Shire’s misery by blowing the final whistle.

There is no point in denying that the pressure is now well and truly on Shire and the coaches have their work cut out to get the scrums and line-outs sorted and functioning to the level they were earlier on in the season.

The backs are lacking the cutting edge they need with tomorrow’s game being of such critical importance; the club needs everyone to be at their best to take on Dunfermline and their will be no hiding place for anyone not fully committed for this crucial relegation battle. Kick-off is at 3pm at McKane Park.

If you have the interests of Perthshire Rugby at heart then please make the short journey to Dunfermline to support the boys in what will be a tense and bruising battle.

A bus will leave at 12.45 (players meet 12.30) and everyone is welcome.