Lacklustre Cumbernauld fall to North Lanarkshire rivals

Cumbernauld’s topsy-turvy seasonal form continues to fluctuate after a “flat” performance at Coatbridge on Saturday in their latest West League Division 2 match against local rivals Waysiders/Drumpellier. Having stormed to a great win against league-leaders, Cambuslang, a week earlier, Cumbernauld were unable to lift their game to any meaningful level on a cold, windy, dreary day in Coatbridge. Although the try score, 3-2 in Waysiders’ favour, suggested a close game, the Badgers never really threatened to take full points from a lacklustre performance.
Waysiders were first to draw blood when they stole Cumbernauld lineout ball, formed a rolling maul and stormed over for a converted try. The home side, now in full-flow, quickly added a second when they scored in the corner following a scrum on the 5-metre line. In mitigation, the 7-man Cumbernauld scrum held up well while Kevin McTier was being treated for a face cut, but Waysiders cleverly rec-cycled the ball and overcame some ineffective Cumbernauld tackling to score an unconverted try.
At this point Cumbernauld realised they could end up on the wrong side of a thrashing and this seemed to galvanise the New Town outfit as they quickly took the game to their Coatbridge hosts. After good handling from the backs, Andrew Reid cut inside and was pinged by the referee just in front of the posts. Another promising Cumbernauld breakout was penalised for a ruck indiscretion and Waysiders took full advantage by slotting over a penalty, giving the home outfit an ominous 15-0 lead. The 3 points conceded from this penalty could have been avoided because the kick was too far out but loose lips enabled the referee to punish Cumbernauld, giving Waysiders an extra 10 metres and thus making the penalty kickable.
At this point Cumbernauld lost hooker Andrew Logan, who has been in excellent form this season, as a result of a leg knock. Chris Anderson came on and substituted valiantly but Waysiders turned the screw and added a third try just before half time following sustained forwards pressure. Just before half time Cumbernauld had a great chance to redress the balance when 2 scrums and drives took them deep into enemy territory, only to concede turnover ball.
It was apparent that after having faced a stiff breeze in the first half, Cumbernauld would have to raise their game in the second half and take advantage of the wind at their back to kick cleverly for good possession. This never materialised as the ongoing lineout weakness in Cumbernauld’s play soon reared its head again. However they never gave up and Jordan Reid scored a typical scrum-half try when he stormed over following excellent driving play from Number 8 Grant Cowie. However any chance of a Cumbernauld recovery disappeared when Andrew Reid was sin-binned 11 minutes from time. Captain Ruaridh Clark scored a late consolation try following excellent support play from his brother, Brodie. In the post-match briefing, Captain Clark highlighted the damage done in the first 15 minutes when Cumbernauld were caught cold by a highly-energised home outfit and shipped the 2 tries leaving a deficit from which they never really recovered. The Blacks continue to have problems in the lineout and perhaps a re-evaluation of strategy and tactics is required in this key area so that less priority is given to winning the ball and more given to disrupting the quality of possession enjoyed by the opposition.
Another problem area for Cumbernauld was their seeming inability to deal with Waysiders’ rolling maul, and hopefully these deficiencies will be addressed at training sessions this week on Tuesday and Thursday at Auchenkilns. This observer found it difficult to identify a man-of-the-match as no, one player did enough to merit the distinction. Next Saturday Cumbernauld face McLaren in the penultimate game of the season with a 3 pm kick-off at Auchenkilns.