Howe of Fife 31 GHA 7
GHA put in a poor performance which ultimately was deserving of a convincing defeat away to Howe of Fife in the 3rd Round of the BT Cup. Howe of Fife for their part were defending a proud home record and put in a powerful display that sees them deservedly take their place in the Cup Quarter Finals where they will no doubt be a match for any side.
Although Howe took an early lead with a penalty, GHA had much of the early pressure but poor execution prevented GHA scoring a couple of early tries – one held up when a massive overlap was on, another overlap was then squandered due to some poor handling. During one of these early forays, GHA suffered the crucial loss of Scrum Half Peter Jericevich who was replaced by U19 scrum half Matt Donaldson, making his first team debut. Whilst it bodes well for the future that GHA had five 18 year olds in their squad, this early disruption was one which seemed to significantly disrupt GHA’s rhythm.
Howe’s Number 8 Chris Mason had an afternoon he is sure to remember for some time, scoring all 4 of Howe’s tries and making a number powerful runs off of the back of a Howe scrum which was under a lot of presuure from the GHA pack. His first score was a well taken surge from a lineout peel on the GHA 5 metre line which gave Howe a 10 nil half time lead.
The second half continued in much the same vein as the first, with GHA conspiring to make a plethora of mistakes in possession, gifting the ball back to Howe whenever a break or half break was made. Mason scored his second try to give Howe a 17 nil lead when GHA were down to 14 men after an extremely dubious yellow card was shown to GHA centre Chris Binnie for an alleged offside.
When Binnie returned, GHA had a strong 10 minutes and although mistakes continued to thwart many opportunities for the visitors, a period of sustained pressure did eventually pay off when Binnie scored arguably the try of the afternoon after some good build up play and a typical scything break from the GHA centre. With 10 minutes left on the clock and the score at 17 to 7, GHA looked like they might turn the game around, however further mistakes and some poor defending saw Mason take full advantage, latching on to two breaks to score twice in the dying seconds.
The silver lining for GHA, if there is one, is that this performance didn’t happen on league duty, to which they return with a game away to Peebles this coming Saturday, KO 3pm.
Howe of Fife: Graham Thomson, Marcus Black, Angus Guthrie, Fraser Clark, Hefin O’Hare, Dom Martin, Stewart Lathangie, Steven Player, Graeme Steedman, Stewart Rattray, Peter Meiklem, Terry Turpie, Brodie Runciman, James Lawrie, Chris Mason – Replacements: Conar Dow, David Wallace, Charlie Black, Calum Willison, Robert Douglas
Scorers: T – Mason (4) C – TBC P – TBC
GHA: Euan McKirdy; Rangi Jericevich, Chris Binnie, Andrew Henderson, Euan Greer; Andrew Goudie, Peter Jericevich; Scott Carson, Lewis Anderson, Mikchael Fox, Adam Barnett, Chris McGeogh, Donald Malcolm, Ross Angus, Alan Auld – Replacements: Jamie Leslie, Paul Harkins, Grant MacDonald, Matt Donaldson, Max MacFarlane
Scorers: T – Binnie C – Goudie
Referee: Mr K. Allen (Edinburgh RS)
