After a long journey South the boys arrived at the historic Greenyards in Melrose on a perfect day for rugby, and got to play on the first team pitch in front of the main stand. They knew their task would be difficult to say the least against a team coached by the legendary former Scotland and British Lions coach, Jim Telfer.
Ellon started brightly and had some good territory and possession in the first ten minutes. But the pace and power of the Melrose pack was soon evident after a 22 dropout was caught and run back towards the Ellon defence. Superb work at the breakdown, swift hands and neat offloading saw the first of five first half tries.
The Ellon boys battled bravely but had no answer to the mightily impressive Melrose pack who made it look as though they had twice as many players as Ellon. The best try of the half came from a searing break in midfield by the Melrose hooker who drew the fullback and timed his pass to perfection for his supporting runner to score under the posts.
The Ellon players were clearly shell-shocked at half time and they knew it would take a miracle to turn the score around. Melrose almost gave Ellon a way back into the match when their two second rows both jumped to claim the kickoff and clashed heads. Both players had to go off for treatment to nasty cuts to the head. However, their replacements didn’t weaken the side as the forwards continued to dominate at the breakdown. Several fine flowing moves involving multiple offloads resulted in a further five second half tries.
It was a great experience and privilege for the boys to play at the historic Greenyards despite the heavy defeat. They will now drop down into the National Bowl competition with a home tie on Saturday. It’s going to be a busy week for the Ellon coaches to build the boys back up from their worst defeat of the season.
Coach Gareth Kemp said.
“ It was a good old fashioned thrashing! We dished out a couple this season and are now on the end of one!”. “We always knew it would be a hard game, but it is a shame not to get a score, especially as we more than competed in the line out and scrum, in fact I would have said we looked the better team in those aspects. We were totally outclassed at the break down and tackle area.” "Ben Shirron had a good game at scrum half, with some great passing under pressure and an extreamly high tackle count."
“We will pick ourselves up, carry on, and have a couple of players back this weekend for the Bowl game.”