Hawick's late show hurts Peebles

Published 26 Feb 2010 13:24 0 Comments

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Hawick 32 v 20 Peebles

Whilst the home side always seemed the more dangerous on the break and dominated territory especially in the last 20 minutes, the Tweed Homes sponsored Peebles led for much of the game; their offensive defence holding off wave after wave of attacks.

The home side kicked off and quickly won the ball back. In their first attack, Peebles were caught diving over and Graham Hogg narrowly missed the penalty attempt.

Five minutes later he slotted the second for a 3-0 lead as the Gytes men were caught off side in their 22.

Hawick were straight on the attack from the restart and only the resolute defence held them out. The visitors won a scrum on their own line and cleared up field, and with a penalty made it all the way to the lineout 5 metres from the home line.

From the lineout, Peebles went blind and good handling from Fraser Strachan to Donald Sangster whose deft pass found James Oakes who went through the Hawick defence almost unchallenged to take the lead, with Neil Warnock adding the conversion for 3-7.

Hawick retaliated straight from the kick off, turned the ball over and went wide left for winger Steve Anderson to make the corner and reclaim the lead at 8-7.

Undaunted the Tweed Homes sponsored side mounted several attacks showing that they could handle and break the gain line as well as the Greens, but the final moves were lost in turnovers or missed passes.

With ball in hand Hawick again challenged the Peebles line again and again. On the 23rd minute a small altercation resulted in a yellow for Steve Gee three metres from the previous line.

From the Hawick scrum, their attack petered out with a knock on and Peebles cleared the immediate danger, subsequently winning a penalty inside the home half, which Neil Warnock came very close with.

A Peebles lineout 10 metres from the line was claimed by Hawick and the home side took the advantage with prop Neil Douglas bursting through tackles, running 22 metres to score putting them 13-7 ahead on 23 minutes.

Another missed penalty after Peebles centre Dale Clancy was unable to roll away after the tackle was missed 10 minutes later when Hawick could easily have extended their lead.

Before the break Neil Warnock again narrowly missed a penalty and one minute into stoppage, a Peebles lineout won by Matt Thompson was quickly transferred to Fraser Strachan, Neil Warnock and then laid off to Craig Borthwick who bullocked through the defence before releasing Dale Clancy 5 metres from the line to go under the posts; Neil Warnock claiming the conversion for a one point interval lead.

From the re-start, Hawick knocked on but Peebles were unable to capitalise, however Hawick standoff Dean McCracken received a 10 minute enforced rest and Neil Warnock knocked the ball of the upright to extend the Peebles lead to four points 13-17.

Midway through the second half, Bruce McNeil made another strong run into the Peebles defence, off loading to Number 8 David Lowrie who went over in the corner to reclaim the lead by one point.

A yellow for a deliberate knock down gave James Oakes a 10 minute rest. The result was 20 minutes of pressure on the Peebles line other than a few brief pushes to the Hawick line.

On 63 minutes Neil Warnock put Peebles two points ahead with another penalty, but this was cancelled out by a final five minutes, when on 41 minutes Graham Hogg got involved in a forward drive and scored with Gary Johnson converting and on the 45th minute when Michael Robertson drove over to deny Peebles the losing bonus and Gary Johnston converted to end proceedings.

Peebles. 1 Willie Aitken, 2 Ryan McConnell, 3 Adam Clark, 4 David Harvey, 5 Matt Thompson, 6 Craig Borthwick, 7 Donald Sangster, 8 James Oakes, 9 Fraser Strachan, 10 Neil Warnock, 11 Neil Hogarth, 12 Steve Gee, 13 Dale Clancy, 14 Allan Smellie & 15 David Anderson. Replacements 16 Trevor Keen, 17 Neil Clark, 18 David Brown & 19 Craig Hunter

This article appeared in Peeblesshire News 26 Feb 10

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