Mackie Festival Winners

Another outstanding 5 undefeated games to lift the Mackie Festival Trophy. Last year at Mackie was our 1st ever festival win and we were very keen to bring it back with us!
A few negative moments of butchering some easy overlaps and a wee bit of greedy play at times (particularly during the Huntly Harlequins/Mackie game) but after a gentle reminder the boys started to play like a team again.

Positives:
• Lots of great wide play this week, with guys from the middle popping up down the wings and scoring.
• Everyone running support lines and being there just in case.
• Kick off communication.
• Some tenacious tacking in the 4-2 win
• We only let in 4 trys all day

Pool 1 Scores
Mackie 0 – 4 Ellon
Ellon 6 – 0 Grammar
Ellon 4 – 2 Huntly Harlequins
Ellon 6 – 1 Garioch

Pool 2
Aberdeen Wanderers have a very small P6 squad and reached out to us on the back of some help last week. Robbie and Jack agreed to help them out this weekend. I managed to catch bits of games and saw a decent chuck of the Deeside game where Wands physically dominated them and then there was a nail-biting game with Grammar who had some of their really good players over on “team 2”. Both Ellon lads got lots of game time, probably more than most of the Ellon lads did, and it is a great way to get more minutes under their belt and I hope we can help in the future. Jack manged to get 4 trys! ?

The Final
Ellon 7 – 1 Wanderers

Player of the Day – Struan
Firstly, lots of guys playing really well again, very solid all round, which is a massive reason we are winning. Similar to last week, when we came under a bit of pressure in game 3 Straun took the game by the scruff of the neck. The difference between a 4-4 draw and our 4-2 win was his determination to chase back 1 meter from the try line. I think one was over the try line, but he manged to drag the players feet into touch. Tenacious would be the only way to describe it!

Most improved – Mac
Joint top try scorer with 5 and as always it seems to be impossible to put him on the deck once he gets going. So many times we think he’s tackled and he somehow pops out the other side into clear space and scores! Pushed up well in defence, to close down space and tackled well. Very solid all round.

Clubmen of the Day – Robbie and Jack
For helping our friends at Aberdeen Wanderers for the entire day!
A shout out to Jamie also who played on the Harlequins team for one game during our break.