Hawick forced to ring changes but still come up trumps against Musselburgh to keep title bid on track

No fewer than five first-team regulars were ruled out of the Greens’ seventh game of the current Scottish Premiership rugby season by attendance at a wedding and others were away on holiday or injured.

Those absences forced head coach Matty Douglas to field a much-changed line-up at Mansfield Park and the result too was a far cry from the 55-5 thumping handed out to the East Lothian outfit in the equivalent fixture last season in November last year.

A win’s a win, though, and Saturday’s result keeps second-placed Hawick’s defence of their title on track, though table-toppers Marr’s 34-28 victory at home to fourth-placed Currie Chieftains means they’ve still got their noses in front for now.

Hawick are on 27 points from seven fixtures, three shy of the league leaders and two ahead of third-placed Heriot’s Blues, their next opponents, with Currie on 22 points but with a game in hand on all three teams above them.

Their director of rugby, Gary Muir, was heartened by the determination his side’s reshuffled line-up displayed in coming from behind repeatedly – trailing 5-0 early on, 10-20 at the break, then 21-25 – to grind out a result, largely thanks to the 17 points delivered by the boot of full-back Kirk Ford but was frustrated at seeing them give themselves a succession of mountains to climb to claim their sixth win of the campaign.

“Saturday’s game versus Musselburgh was a little too close for comfort,” he told us.

“A lot has been made of the number of individuals we had missing but that is not an excuse we are looking to use as every player at the club, in our opinion, is ready to play first-XV rugby.

“Musselburgh were a good, well-organised team and were not scared to come at us, but despite not being at our best, we ground out the win.”

Hawick host Heriot’s, 26-13 victors at Selkirk at the weekend, this coming Saturday, with kick-off at 3pm, venues having been switched at the Edinburgh team’s request.

The Greens beat the Goldenacre outfit home and away last season, by 52-21 last September and 27-12 in January and Muir wants to see them keep up those winning ways this weekend.

“Our coaches and players have analysed areas we can improve and have set about putting it right this weekend versus Heriot’s,” he said.

“Heriot’s will be a different test as we know Phil Smith likes his team to throw the ball about and play an attractive brand of rugby.

“However, if we perform to our best, we should be on the right end of the result come 5pm on Saturday.”

The hosts’ tries were scored by captain Shawn Muir and centre Andrew Mitchell, with Ford kicking one conversion and no fewer than five penalties.

Touching down for Musselburgh were winger Sandy Watt, flanker Jordan Lister, No 8 Paul Bogie and replacement Colin Arthur, with Matt McMillan adding a conversion and a penalty.