Former Southern Knight Craig Jackson’s boot kicks Selkirk to derby double over Jed-Forest

The Souters followed up their 36-10 victory in the reverse fixture at home at Philiphaugh eight days earlier with a 28-19 win at Jedburgh’s Riverside Park at the weekend.

As well as keeping head coach Scott Wight’s fourth-placed Selkirk side within three points of third-placed Edinburgh Academical, 22-21 victors at home to second-placed Currie Chieftains on Saturday, that result saw his opposite number Andrew Brown draw a blank in derbies in his debut season at Jed, having lost to Hawick twice too.

Stand-off Jackson got the lion’s share of Selkirk’s points, kicking three penalties and two conversions. Alan Ferrie touched down two of their three tries, Jack Hamilton getting the other.

Their hosts’ tries were scored by Robbie Shirra-Gibb, Mason Cullen and Garry Young, with Finlay Scott converting two.

The last of those tries saw Jed taking advantage of their numerical advantage, Selkirk’s Luke Pettie and Callum Anderson both being sin-binned at that point, along with the hosts’ Dom Buckley.

Saturday’s result, 12 games into the season, sees the Souters on 39 points, six clear of fifth-placed Glasgow Hawks, and Jed second bottom on 18 but eight better off than basement side Musselburgh and only one behind third-bottom Heriot’s Blues.

Selkirk are looking for their fourth win on the trot at home to Musselburgh this coming Saturday, with kick-off at 3pm, and Jed are on the road at Glasgow Hawks, playing an hour earlier.

Jackson was delighted to have got the better of Jed twice in the space of just over a week, telling Borders Rugby TV afterwards: “We were probably surprised by how good a start we got, to be honest.

“We knew they’d come out firing after last week, but I don’t think they fired the shots they probably could have.

“They’ve got some good players in their team, so we came over here and we knew they were going to try to do something to us.

“When we got off to a fast start, it was good for us but we knew there’d be a backlash and probably sat off them a little bit, and fair play to them, they played in the right areas, as was to be expected.

“We knew they were going to come back with something else and something more.

“We didn’t think they’d fired many shots last week and we know they’ve got a little more firepower within them, but we knew we had a little bit more as well so we just set out to come back this week and control what we could control and try to put our mark on the game.”

Jed captain Clark Skeldon accepted the better side had won, saying: “Obviously last week hurt a lot.

“We spoke through the week about getting a bit of pride back and I thought we did that in spells, but they are a good side and though we gave a better showing today, ultimately we just came up short.

“We’re disappointed not to have got anything from the game.”