Winning streak goes on for Gala as Melrose and Kelso slip up

Scott Peffers scoring for Gala against Boroughmuir (Photo: Bill McBurnie)

Gala, on 19 points from five games, were the only one of the Borders’ three sides in the division to win on Saturday, with Melrose losing 20-5 away to Biggar and Kelso going down 35-25 at Ayr after having captain Andy Tait sent off half an hour in.

Next up for the Galashiels team is a trip to ninth-placed Dundee this Saturday.

Melrose and Kelso are both at home at the weekend, with the former hosting third-bottom Cartha Queen’s Park and the latter Biggar, in fourth place with 16 points from four games.

Gala's Andrew Mitchell in action against Boroughmuir (Photo: Bill McBurnie)

All three of those games kick off at 3pm.

Andrew Mitchell and Scott Peffers scored two tries for Gala at Netherdale, with Fergus Johnston adding another and Craig Dods supplying a penalty and conversions.

“It was a good game for us,” Gala captain Liam Scott told Borders Rugby TV. “It was scrappy, the weather wasn’t great and we just had to come out and get the result.

“We didn’t want to get complacent. We’ve had some big wins behind us and that, so we just wanted to come out here and perform on a bad day and we did that, so we’re pretty pleased.

Scott Peffers scoring a try against Boroughmuir (Photo: Bill McBurnie)

“We’re going in the right direction and we just need to keep building.”

Melrose’s only scorer against Biggar at Hartreemill was Struan Hutchison with an unconverted try.

Reflecting on the Greenyards side’s first defeat of the season, head coach Bruce Colvine said: “It’s always going to be difficult coming to Biggar. They play their style and brand of rugby really effectively and with the conditions and everything else, it was always going to be an uphill task for us.

“Full credit to Biggar, they played well and they stuck to their game-plan and for large parts of that game we weren’t in it at all.”

Kelso director of rugby Neil Hinnigan felt his side were unfortunate to have nothing to show for a battling perormance, saying: “We were really unlucky not to come away with something from the game.

“We just made some really silly errors at times, but ultimately it’s a learning curve and we’re still on the up, we feel, as a club.”