New day dawning for rugby’s Southern Knights after sprint series whitewash

Hawick's Corey Tait on the ball for Boroughmuir Bears during their 26-21 wooden-spoon play-off win at home to Southern Knights on Saturday (Photo: Bryan Robertson)

The Melrose-based team were in front or all square for the entirety of their last match of the series at Edinburgh’s Meggetland Sports Complex except when it counted, their hosts sneaking ahead via an unconverted Jerry Blyth-Lafferty try near the end to edge out the Borderers by 26-21 and take fifth place in the table at their expense.

Knights’ tries were scored by Rudi Brown, captain Russell Anderson and Adam Hall, with Callum Grieve converting all three.

Bears’ others were touched down by Hawick’s Corey Tait, Trystan Andrews and Liam McConnell, with Tom Quinlan adding two conversions and George Paul another.

Southern Knights' Rory Brand getting a tackle in on Boroughmuir Bears' Trystan Andrews on Saturday (Photo: Bryan Robertson)

The visitors’ head coach, Alan Tait, was disappointed to see his side let victory slip from their grasp but also heartened by the way they adapted to a last-minute line-up change after having new recruit Donald Crawford ruled out by a warm-up injury.

“It was a frustrating one,” said the former Scottish international. “We had plenty of opportunities to win the game.

“It’s just where we are at the minute. Our preparation just couldn’t have gone any worse.

“Donald Crawford was in for his first game in midfield and he’d looked good in training all week and it had settled everybody down seeing that we were getting an experienced guy in there, a big man, but he pulled up in the warm-up five minutes before kick-off. It didn’t help.

Southern Knights on the ball at Boroughmuir Bears on Saturday (Pic: Bryan Robertson)

“It wasn’t the best preparation and I think it kind of rattled the lads but they still got stuck in.

“We were in the game and we had chances to win it.”

Tait, 58, is now about to rebuild his squad ahead of the start of this year’s Fosroc Super Series Championship, expanded to seven teams this time round by the addition of a Scotland under-20 development team, at the end of July.

“That was the end of the sprint and it’s the end of that squad really as I’ll be losing quite a few players as they’d only signed for the sprint,” he said.

“We haven’t got long to go, so it’s going to be a rush again but at least we’ve got a little bit of a break before we start pre-season. It won’t be long coming round.”