Clean sweep of defeats for Peebles, Gala and Jed-Forest in rugby’s Arnold Clark National League Division 1

Peebles got closest to a victory, only being edged out by 29-28 at home to seventh-placed Highland, and Jed-Forest lost by the biggest margin, going down 72-15 hosting second-placed Stirling County, with Gala not far behind, losing 67-14 away to third-placed Glasgow Academicals.

Those sixth-round results leave Gala fourth in the standings on 19 points, Peebles sixth on 13 and Jed eighth on 12.

This coming Saturday sees the Maroons hosting fifth-placed Biggar, the Pees away to table-topping Glasgow Hutchesons’ Aloysians and Jed at home to basement side Dundee.

Replacement Ritchie Mitchell and No 8 Craig Keddie scored Gala’s tries, both converted by Russell Kerr, at New Anniesland.

Stu Collier, Jack McCready, Adam Scott, Jordan Craig, Ross Cowan, Russell Morton twice, Connor Niblock, Olli Nash and Adam Ryan touched down for their hosts, also awarded a penalty try.

Lock Finlay Collins, full-back Rory McHaffie at the double and outside-centre James Dow touched down for Peebles at home at the Gytes, with McHaffie adding four conversions.

Jed-Forest’s tries at Riverside Park were scored by bindside flanker Ben Fotheringham and lock and captain Clark Skeldon, with openside flanker Finn Scott adding a penalty and conversion.

Gala captain Angus Dun is hoping to see his side bounce back versus Biggar, telling Borders Rugby TV: “Credit to Glasgow Accies, they were fast and fit and ran us round the park.

“We suffered a similar sort of defeat against Glasgow Hutchesons’ Aloysians a wee bit earlier this season and turned it around and got a good win at home the following week, so hopefully we can do that.

“We just have to learn some lessons from that and take it from there.”

Jed lock Jamie Hynd is also looking at their loss on Saturday as a learning experience, saying: “If you look at the team we’ve got, it’s a very young, inexperienced one. We’ve got a lot of boys who just came up last year.

“When you come up against experienced boys who played in the Super6 last year, it’s just something you’re going to have to expect, but in fairness to all our boys, they did put up a fight to the very end.

“We’ve got a few key games that we’re going to have to target that we know we should be winning and can win, and especially at home, and we’ve got Dundee next, so we’ve got to come out flying at the weekend.”

Peebles captain and scrum-half Jack Harrison added: “We had a good game against Highland and came out of the blocks pretty well at the start and went 10-0 up but it was a bit of a see-saw affair later on and they managed to get themselves in front towards the end of the game and we couldn’t get over the line at the end.

“We had a couple of chances but unfortunately it wasn’t to be.”