Royal High vs. Haddington Match Report

Haddington RFC travelled to the Capital on Saturday looking to maintain their unbeaten start to the season to face Royal High RFC.
The coaching team had to make some forced changes to the Haddington pack on the lead up to the squad announcement, with Robert “Rab” Watt coming in for the injured Garry Cockburn and Macauley Park returned to the starting line-up after being unavailable last week. Nick Bell returned to the 1st XV squad for the first-time this season, replacing Ewan Cunningham on the bench.

On a blustery day in Baberton, Haddington opted to play into the wind in the first half, with Royal High opting to kick off with the winds at their backs.

It was the home team who drew first blood, with the Reds giving away a penalty just inside their half. Fly-half Euan Morrison signalled to the posts and stepped up to slot the goal and give Royal High the lead. 3-0.

Haddington had to wait until the 20-minute mark to get the scoreboard rolling in their favour. With a scrum deep into the Royal High half, the forward pack drove towards the line and set up a maul about 5-meters from the opposition line. Young scrumhalf, Kirk Washington-MacKay then took play back down the blindside and spotted a gap in the home defence to burry his way of over the try line. Donald Bathgate added the extras to take the scores to 3-7.

Royal High continued to put pressure on the Haddington side and the pressure eventually paid off after being awarded a scrum on the Haddington 5-meter line. With clean ball, Morrison was able to feed his outside centre through a gap in the Haddington defence to go over underneath the sticks. Morrison added the conversion to make it 10-7.

In a stop/start first half, Royal High managed to squeeze in another try before the end of the half, after their pack managed to steam roll over the whitewash. With the conversion secured, Royal High led 17-10 at the break.

With Haddington now playing with the wind at their backs, Donald Bathgate produced an excellent clearance kick, deep into Royal High territory. The subsequent kick chase was superb and Bathgate was able to get on the end of a mistake from the Royal High winger to kick the ball up towards the Royal High try line. However, it was scrumhalf MacKay who won the foot race to touch the ball down. Bathgate added the extras to take the scores to 17-17.

Haddington continued to dominate the third quarter of the game, with Captain Connor Munro crashing over the home side try line. The number 8 picked a great attacking line between the Royal High defence. 17-24.

On a busy afternoon for the Haddington scrumhalf, MacKay was up again for his third and final try of the day, after snipping down the blindside in typical scrumhalf fashion. Some great feet work saw him beat the last defender and sprint over the try line.

Paul McClung was up next for Haddington, with Haddington securing the scrum just left of centre. McClung was able to get on the end of a superbly weighted pass from outside-centre, Kyle Hamilton and sprint in under the posts. Replacement flyhalf, Nick Bell secured the extras.

With less than 10-minutes of the game remaining, some quick thinking from Vice-Captain, Andrew Durkin saw the inside-centre kick the ball deep into the Royal High half from the penalty. With the rub of the green, the ball bounced out and Haddington had the line-out on the Royal High 5-meter line. A great driving maul saw the Haddington pack drive towards the line but came up just short. The pack re-grouped and picked from the base of the ruck to drive over the line for the try. Nick Bell was on hand to add the extra two points.

However, it was Royal High who had the last laugh and in fairness to the home side, they finished the game strongly by adding two late tries in the last 5-minutes of the game.

Final score Royal High 29 – Haddington 40.

With this win on the road, Haddington are now three games unbeaten, having taken maximum points in each to warrant their top of the table position. Next up, we face newly promoted Langholm at Neilson Park (Saturday 23rd of September | KO 3pm). The players and coaching group are all to aware of the challenge that awaits when a Border team come knocking and know they will need to put together another clinical performance.,

Man of the Match: Kirk Washington-MacKay (Sponsored by Willie MacKay)