BT Regional Shield Quarter-Final

By Tom Dickson

GARNOCK 17

ANNAN 24

TEN seasons after their famous day at Murrayfield, Garnock faced Annan in the current season’s BT Regional Shield competition.

Unfortunately, the result means no nostalgic return to Murrayfield this season.

After a week of heavy and sometimes seemingly incessant rainfall, the pitches at Lochshore looked and played superbly, allowing the players no reason to complain about the playing surface.

Garnock’s Keir Walker kicked off towards the town end in overhead dry conditions but slightly greasy underfoot.

The opening scrum and lineout were won “against the head” by Garnock auguring well for the home side.

Annan were awarded a scrum near the half way line. With the scrum won, they elected to run the ball and centre Alex Halliday powered his way through the opposition to touchdown at the posts. Craig McCann converted and, with six minutes played, Garnock were 7-0 adrift.

From the restart, Annan again ran the ball back inside the Garnock half. A knock-on gave Garnock the scrum. The pack delivered the ball to debutant scrum half, Gregor Armstrong. When centre Jared Reekie received the ball on the 22 metre line, he spied a gap and jinked and weaved his way to score a typical Reekie try at the posts. Walker converted and Garnock were level after eight minutes.

Play swung from end to end with neither squad looking like breaching the tight defences. At this stage both sides were guilty of poor passing resulting in several players knocking on and setting a spell of several scrums.

From a line out on the Garnock 22 line, Annan won the ball and fed out to McCann. With nowhere to go, the stand off had time to score a drop goal in 22 minutes, making it 10-7 for Annan.

On the half hour Garnock drew level when Walker converted a penalty after Annan were caught offside in centre-field 20 metres out.

Annan restarted and camped well inside the home half. They scored two converted tries in 44 and 48 minutes. The first came when McCann rounded off a solo break by touching down at the posts.

The second came from full back, Cairn Wallace, who was fastest to a kick through to score near the posts. McCann converted both to make the score 10 -24 to Annan after 48 minutes.

For the next 15 minutes play swung from 22 line to 22 line with neither side looking like altering the scoreboard. Garnock were looking the better side and gradually forced their way close to the Annan try line. They had several attempts at powering their way over the score line but the Annan defence was solid.

From a scrum five metres out, the ball was fed to Walker, the stand-off saw a gap and sped through to score at the posts for a fine individualistic try. He converted to make the score 24-17 after 67 minutes.

This made for an interesting last 10 minutes with Garnock enjoying most of the possession but finding gaps in the Annan defence non-existent.

GARNOCK: Wynn; O’Neill, Shiells, McGeachey, Watson, Johnston, DR Miller, Dominy, Armstrong, Walker, Woods, Reekie, Taggart, Brocket, Anderson, Gibb, Jones, Blackwood.

On Saturday Garnock are back on league business when the play host to Carrick from Maybole at Lochshore, ko 3pm.