by John Preece Royal High Corstorphine (RHC) played their season opener at their home ground at Barnton, against Linlithgow, a game which turned out to be the proverbial ‘game of two halves’.
RHC opened their account with less than 6 minutes on the clock, with a well worked try into the corner. The conversion was missed, but a penalty a few minutes later put the home side 8-0 ahead. The next 10 minutes saw them repeating the pattern with another unconverted try and scored penalty. A period of sustained pressure on the Linlithgow line eventually had RHC No. 7 scoring under the posts, which this time was converted to go into the break well on track, it appeared, for the win against a rather lacklustre Linlithgow side.
However, no one appeared to have mentioned this to Linlithgow as they proceeded to dominate the second half scoring their own three tries, one conversion and a penalty to bring the score to 23-20 with a few minutes to go.
Almost on the final whistle, however, the referee awarded RHC a penalty near the posts which the kicker duly slotted home to give RHC the win – and no bonus point – with 26 points, to Linlithgow’s – with one bonus point – 20 points.
Report and photo – John Preece
Web – http://www.photoboxgallery.com/jlp-photography
