Peebles 29

Hamilton Bulls 20

Allan Beveridge

at The Gytes

IT was beginning to feel a lot like Christmas on Saturday as Peebles made it 19 points from a possible 20 in their past four matches.

However the last league game of 2019 at The Gytes was no stroll in the park, even if Peebles had gained a try bonus point before the interval.

Ahead of Saturday's match with Hamilton there was a minute's silence as a tribute to Tom Rankine.

The former Peebles stand off and captain, who had returned to the town if his birth only a couple of years ago after many years in the North of Scotland, sadly passed away.

Tom will be fondly remembered by many former players including this scribe.

Saturday's visitors showed plenty of enterprise during the early stages of the match.

Following several attacks Owen McLeish opened the scoring for the visitors with a long range penalty.

Hamilton were unlucky not to go further ahead in the 15th minute when McLeish chipped the Peebles backs, but right winger Ben Plant juggled the ball with the Peebles line beckoning before knocki.

At this stage both sets of forwards were controlling their own scrums until David Collins for Peebles stole the ball from his opposite number.

Collins made good ground before managing to off load to Ryan Stewart who took the ball into dangerous territory for the visitors, but the ball was eventually lost.

From that line out Peebles were penalised and McLeish added another three points from the kick at goal.

From the Hamilton restart Rohan Maciver took a clean catch, to allow the backs and forwards to combine well for Kieran Brown to score in the left corner.

Greg Raeburn added the difficult conversion into the wind for a 7- 6 lead.

Approaching the half hour Donald Anderson made a lovely break through the middle before being tripped by Hamilton second row Ewen Ferris, who was yellow carded.

It was during his exile that Peebles took the bull by the horns and scored three tries.

The first was a catch and drive from a line out and Brown secured his second try, which Raeburn converted.

Roddy Guiney was next to touch down after an individual effort.

Raeburn’s conversion hit the upright.

But in injury time Neil Hogarth, with one of his good runs into the Hamilton 22, passed inside for Collins to score under the posts. Raeburn made it 26-6 with the conversion.

It was expected that having the wind at their backs Peebles would go on and score many more.

But it was the Bulls who were on top for much of the 40 minutes.

Ferrie scored a well-worked try and in the closing stages Nathan Brown went over in the left corner. Wilson added both the conversions.

Apart from a Raeburn penalty Peebles couldn't add to their tally.

Peebles: Callum Anderson, Ruairidh Clinch, Murray Brown, Donald Anderson, James Dow, Greg Raeburn, David Collins, Willie Aitken, Ryan Stewart, Jamie Menzies, Ritchie Reid, Roddy Guiney, Callum Gray, Rohan Maciver, Kieran Brown, Neil Hogarth, John Gray, David Anderson & James Matthews.