Hawick Harlequins 52-5 Hawick Linden: Quins ease past spirited Royal Blues

Quinn's Nicky little gets this over the line for his second try against Linden at Volunteer Park (picture: Bill McBurnie)

Missing some keys players, the Royal Blues put in a sterling effort in spite of the final scoreline.

In the first minute a Linden kick was run back up the cricket field touch line and Steven Mabon was on hand to take the scoring pass to give the Quins a dream start. A long period of pressure, with the Quins scrum in the ascendancy, ended with No. 8 Ross Nichol crashing over off a short ball. Dean Gillan added the conversion.

On the half hour mark Nichol suffered a serious knee injury attempting to charge down a Linden clearance kick and was stretchered off. Centre James Delaney then blocked a Linden kick, after good play by Matthew Mallin, and picked up the loose ball to touch down and put his team 17-0 ahead at the break.

After the turn around it was the Quins who had more possession, mostly in the Linden 22, but initially weren’t able to turn into points until a line out catch and drive allowed Nicky Little to secure the touch down.

Kieran Murphy almost intercepted in his own 22, which could have spelt danger, but he couldn’t hold on. From the resultant scrum, Quins first went blind then came open and Little scored under the posts.

On 60 minutes a kick ahead sat up kindly and two passes later Quins centre Jordan Hyslop was racing under the sticks. Jack Wilson was next to charge down a clearing kick and the hard working Linden lock looked likely to score but was tugged back but no penalty was forthcoming.

A hefty accidental collision saw Linden’s Ryan Renwick knocked unconscious for a short period. He was attended to by a paramedic already on scene for Quins’ Nichol, both were taken to hospital best wishes to both.

After Royal Blue winger Greg Scott was yellow carded, Little squeezed over for his try hat-trick and then Mabon secured his second of the day from a driving maul. Gillan converted all five second half tries to put the Quins 52-0 in front.

Wilson then showed his skills fielding a kick, chipping ahead and was up to take the bounce but his offload in the 22 was intercepted. The Royal Blues though had the final say. Scrum-half Euan Wood tapped a penalty, had dart at the line and, from the ruck, Mallin dived over in the corner.