Peebles 41

Hillhead Jordanhill 17

Allan Beveridge

at The Gytes

PEEBLES continued their winning ways and picked up a very important four-try bonus point despite having to come from behind on Saturday.

The Gytes men should have taken an early lead in this game but in the first two minutes good attacking was brought to a stop with two poor passing errors when tries could have been scored.

But it was the visitors who took a shock lead.

Hillhead won a penalty decision on half way and stand off Darren Knox punted the ball to touch in the Peebles 22.

The catch and drive resulted in Alec Cameron diving over for the first score. Knox converted for a seven point advantage.

It was not until the quarter hour mark before Peebles hit back.

Peebles won a lineout through Ross Brown to allow scrum half Murray Johnstone to splay a fine pass out to Keiran Brown who had dropped off the lineout and the resultant ruck.

Brown charged over between the posts.

Greg Raeburn's conversion was charged down.

Only a few minutes later the visitors extended their lead when they were awarded a penalty for offside on the Peebles 10 metre line.

If that wasn't bad enough the referee yellow carded Peebles prop Willie Aitken - a decision which baffled the home crowd.

Knox kicked the penalty to make the score 5-10 in favour of the city team.

The next score was an almost a solo effort from half way by Raeburn.

He stepped inside several opponents and made good ground to about 15 metres from the line before being caught.

Raeburn slipped a pass to Callum Anderson in support, who gave the ball back inside for Raeburn to cross the line and touch down.

This time his conversion sailed between the posts.

On the half hour mark the referee made his presence felt again.

There was a difference of opinion between the two sets of forwards which was not serious.

Mr Downing yellow carded Kenny Clyde from Peebles and Alec Cameron from Hillhead.

He did miss the fact that the visitors full back had run 15 metres to have a punch at the Peebles forward.

Both teams were now down to 14 men and just on half time Raeburn added a penalty which made the score at the break 15-10.

Shortly after the restart Scott Stoddard scored his first try after very good play by Murray Johnstone, Raeburn and Conor Blyth.

Raeburn converted for a 22-10 lead.

Peebles obviously taken a talking to by the coaches Bruce McNaughton and Drew Moore during the interval.

They played a much better brand of running rugby in the second period with the forwards having great penetrating runs and Ross Brown, Keiran Brown and Peebles man of the match Ryan Stewart coming to the fore.

The visitors did close the gap through left winger Jimmy Gemmell with Knox's conversion bringing the score 22-17.

But Peebles continued to enjoy the upper hand and played in a manner which has made The Gytes a very difficult place for visitors to win.

Further tries were added by Ross Brown, Murray Johnstone and Scott Stoddart in the closing 20 minutes.