U16 Aberdeenshire 27 Highland 22 - 25th September 2005

After an indifferent start to the league the visitors were the unknown quantity of highland .As they trooped into the changing rooms some of the colts coaches thought that they had sent their u18 team by mistake, most of their team had certainly had their weetabix

The shire lads had a determined look about them as they warmed up and they backed this up as the game started. Shire got right amongst the highland forwards with some hard tackling and turned them over on various occasions, one of which was fed out through the hands to Liam Smith who finished well. Play was raging around with both teams contesting every breakdown, further pressure from shire on highlands 22 ended up with captain Andrew Cook going over under the posts. This kick started Highland who then had a concerted period of pressure resulting in a well worked try.

Again Shire came storming back, good aggressive rucking was resulting in quick ball which led to Calvin Cox going over to put shire17-7 up. The indiscipline of the highland coach on the touchline consistently chipping the ref seemed to rub off on their players resulting in the prop having an early bath for some interesting footwork. Highland were not finished though and came back into the game with 2 further tries.

15 minutes to go and tempers were frayed with both captains being warned by the ref. The shire forwards were now right up for the challenge and were dominating the scrum , lineout and the breakdown battering highlands line, with Glynn Geddie and Alan Stuart controlling things at the base shire made the breakthrough with Andrew Cook and Calvin Cox crossing again. Calvin Cox , Jevon Ferguson and Glynn Geddie all unfortunately being held up over the tryline.

The highland captain finished the game in style with a solo effort from his own 10 yard line bringing the score back to 27-22.

The story of the game was better technique blew away the physical advantage that highland had and committed defence from midfield from Liam Smith in particular led to an impressive team performance overall if only some players would stop ignoring the 3 man overlap!!