Southern Knights head coach Alan Tait urging players to stop doing things by halves following third defeat in four games in rugby’s Fosroc Super Series Championship

​The good news from Tait’s perspective is that, so far this season, he’s seen two promising first-half performances from the Melrose-based side and two good second-half displays.

The bad news is that they’ve been spread over four games and the other 40 minutes of those matches failed to pass muster.

Saturday’s game at Edinburgh’s Meggetland sports complex saw Knights’ second flying start of the campaign after their opener at home at the Greenyards to the Fosroc Future XV at the end of July.

Back then, the Borderers got themselves 22-12 in front by half-time only to almost throw the game away, snatching a 39-38 victory from the jaws of defeat right at the death.

Saturday’s gone’s game followed a similar trajectory without the redeeming feature of a winning final flourish.

Going into the break 20-15 up, Tait reckoned his side had a win in the bag if they kept on going as they had been, but instead they suffered a second-half collapse, failing to add to their score and allowing head coach Graham Shiel’s Bears to run out 44-20 winners.

“I just don’t know what went wrong,” said the 59-year-old. “For 40 minutes, against a strong breeze, we’d played really, really well.

“Boroughmuir looked as if they were shot to pieces. I said to the boys at half-time ‘let’s just finish them off’, but in the second half it was just as if somebody had switched us off. It was just completely the opposite of the first half. We were flat.

“We’d had a couple of injuries forcing players to come off, so whether it was down to those personnel changes or whether it was just attitude I don’t know.

“It wasn’t rugby that beat us – it wasn’t that we were beaten by a better team – it was just desire and attitude that beat us and I think that’s more disappointing than getting beaten by a good team, to be honest. I don’t know which is worse.

“The second 40 minutes were a real kick in the teeth, really poor.

“Boroughmuir would be the first to admit they’re not one of the big dogs in this league. We’ve played the two big dogs, Watsonians and Ayrshire Bulls. Boroughmuir are a bit like ourselves, with a lot of youngsters, but they scrapped for everyting.”

Two of Knights’ tries at the weekend were scored by Corbin Thunder and the other by Paddy Anderson, with Callum Grieve adding a conversion and a penalty.

Touching down for their hosts were Trystan Andrews, Max Loboda, Joe Jenkins, Kieran Westlake, Euan Muirhead at the double, Jack Fisher and Hawick’s Corey Tait, with George Paul and Andy McLean adding conversions.

Knights’ third loss of the season leaves them sitting second-bottom of the table on seven points from four fixtures ahead of a visit on Saturday, September 2, with kick-off at 3pm, from the team immediately above them, Stirling Wolves, 92-14 victors against the Fosroc Future XV at the weekend.