Home win for Reds against Peebles

Newton Stewart RFC 28 – 22 Peebles RFC
Tennent’s National League Division 2
Saturday 19th October 2019

Newton Stewart RFC played host to Peebles RFC last weekend in their latest league fixture. Peebles have had a strong start to the season and look to be in with a shout of promotion this year. Having lost the last three games back-to-back the Reds were hoping for a strong performance in front of their home crowd.
Newton Stewart got off to a great start when scrum-half Robbie McCornick burst from the back of an early scrum to make a superb break. He found support with him and got the ball out to flanker Calum Gaw who seared over the line for the opening try for Newton Stewart. His brother Jack lined up to kick the conversion but missed narrowly right.
Just five minutes later Jack Gaw got another shot at goal when Peebles gave away a penalty deep in the Newton Stewart half. He found the target this time to extend their lead to 8 – 0 with less than ten minutes on the clock.
A long spell of Peebles attack followed. The Reds defended solidly initially, however the visitors utilised the wind and their scrum dominance well, eventually resulting in an unconverted try.
Ten minutes passed with more sustained Peebles pressure. Again there was tireless defence from Newton Stewart, however persistence paid off for Peebles and with half an hour on the clock the visitors surged ahead 8 – 12.
The Reds found themselves in a strong position from the restart, with a lineout deep in the Peebles half. They were awarded a penalty in the resultant play for ‘not releasing’ and Jack Gaw narrowed the gap to 11 – 12.
Just five minutes later Newton Stewart burst through the Peebles defences once again with an excellent break from centre Fraser Morton. The ball went through the hands and once again it was Calum Gaw who dived for the line to score at full stretch. No conversion, it was 16 -12 with five minutes left in the first half.
The remainder of the half was played out on the Newton Stewart try line as Peebles looked for a retaliatory score. Their scrum was dominating the Reds and they used this to their advantage, eventually being awarded a penalty try by the referee on the half-time whistle to finish the half at 16 – 19.
After the interval Newton Stewart put themselves under unnecessary pressure right away with some poor kicking. This was compounded five minutes later when prop Liam Brawls was shown a yellow card and had to spend ten minutes in the sinbin.
Under the cosh, the Reds lifted their game. Some strong running from Mark McCornick set up a try for stand-off David Gaw to add his contribution to the family points tally! When Jack’s conversion kick bounced off the posts moment later to leave the Reds one point behind there would be a few people on both sides wondering whether that bit of bad luck would be the difference between victory and defeat.
Newton Stewart had some sustained possession and pressure now, but struggled to find their way through the solid Peebles defence. The moment came with the visitors back in possession and throwing a pass wide. Fraser Morton intercepted the ball and sped off down the pitch to score the bonus point try for the Reds under the posts, with the conversion added to make it 28 – 22 with ten minutes to play.
It was a nervous finale to this match for both sides as Peebles got some possession and tried to find their way through for a late upset. Ultimately the Newton Stewart defence held out however and the Reds got their 5-point victory.
Hooker Thomas MacDonald tackled heroically in this match and was a key player in defence. Robbie McCornick had a strong game at scrum-half, keeping the Red scrum out of trouble as much as possible with his quick pick-ups.
This week’s Craig Wilson Ltd Man of the Match though was Calum Gaw who had an overall good performance in the back row and scored two tries to boot.
The Reds have a week off now but will resume their campaign on Saturday 2nd November with a game away to Preston Lodge, Edinburgh.
Team: Russell Morton, Robert Service, Fraser Morton, Jack Gaw, David Adams, David Gaw, Robbie McCornick, Ross Campbell, Thomas MacDonald, Liam Brawls, James McMiken, Mark Craig, Mark McCornick (capt), Calum Gaw, Jason McKie. Subs: Jamie Muir, Ronan McDonald, Martin Wallace, Ross Drysdale.