Positives outweigh negatives​ as development rugby side featuring six Borderers get off to losing start v Italy’s U23s, according to national first-XV head coach Gregor Townsend

​Hawick’s Rhys Tait, Gala’s Kerr Johnston and Melrose’s Harri Morris all started for the hosts at Edinburgh’s Hive Stadium – at openside flanker, right-winger and hooker respectively – making way, along with five of their team-mates, for eight replacements on 55 minutes.

Those substitutes – brought on three minutes after Selkirk’s Callum Smyth had taken over from Mikey Jones at loosehead prop – included Melrose’s Rudi Brown and Gala’s Nairn Moncrieff.

The young Scots’ only try of the match was touched down by tighthead prop Ollie Blyth-Lafferty, drafted to Selkirk for the current Arnold Clark Premiership season, on 34 minutes, with his Edinburgh academy team-mate Connor McAlpine converting.

Ex-Gala and Border Reivers star Townsend, 51, was impressed by the account his youngsters, captained by blindside flanker Liam McConnell, gave of themselves despite going down four tries to one, saying: “That’s close to professional level and for a lot of the players, especially ours, that’s the highest level they’ve played at, so they would have got a lot from it.

“It’s just a shame we couldn’t score more points in the second half.

“I felt we had a lot of that game in the first half. Credit to Italy – at times they defended well, just like we defended well close to our line.

“It was a proper game. It’s not just the experience of playing at that higher level – they really impressed us during the week at training.

“There were five under-20-year-olds there, so I’d imagine their target will be playing well for the under-20s, and that experience of playing at a high level today should help them.

“And you’ve got players who played at pro level last week, others that are playing elsewhere and a couple of club players, and we just want to make sure that whatever their next challenge is, and their next level of rugby, that it’s been of benefit to them.

“It’s been great. It’s been a different context – not being in a hotel and being ready for a game in front of 60,000 to 70,000 people but working with a group of players, coming in and seeing their excitement at playing and then them getting really stuck in.

“We want to do more of these games.”

Marcos Gallorini, captain Luca Andreani, Marco Scalabrin and Mirko Belloni scored the Italian age-grade team’s tries, with Mattia Ferrarin kicking two conversions.

Brown is now with Vannes in France, Morris at Edinburgh, Smyth and Johnston at Glasgow Warriors, Tait at Doncaster Knights and Moncrieff at Edinburgh.

The new squad form part of a national academy pilot programme launched in September to create a new performance pathway following the scrapping of the semi-professional Fosroc Super Series earlier this year.

John Dalziel, Steve Tandy, Pieter de Villiers and former Melrose draft player Peter Horne were also involved in coaching the youngsters.