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| CAITHNESS 23 - HIGHLAND 13 by Iain Grant |
| Fri 19th Sep 2008 |
The Greens weathered some sticky spells to post a morale-boosting victory in Saturday’s north derby.
Caithness and Highland have both mounted promotion pushes in recent Scottish Hydro Electric National League Division 2 campaigns.
But their sights this time are very much set on consolidation as they seek to bed in a crop of promising young bloods.
Caithness were boosted on Saturday by an infusion of experience in the form of David Pottinger, William Mill and Danny Budge.
All made their first appearances for a side in which Kris Hamilton and Gary Mackay were again fielded at stand-off and full-back respectively.
The back division was further rejigged with James Paterson teaming up with Danny Gordon in the third different midfield pairing in three games.
Highland recovered from a slow start and threatened to take a stranglehold of the game early in the second half when they went 8-5 ahead.
But the city combine faded badly as 18 unanswered points by the Greens put them in easy street.
An injury-time try for the visitors did not narrow the gap enough to earn them a bonus point.
Highland included former Wick High fly-half Jonathan Wylie whose return to his home county was marred by a painful chest injury which led to his substitution midway through the second half.
The visitors also had Ali Kennedy, a one-time Caithness mini when he lived in Thurso, at outside centre.
Highland, who had lost their first two league matches, were starved of possession in the opening 10 minutes by when most of their players had still to touch the ball.
Several bullocking runs by Gordon featured in the Greens’ purposeful opening in which scrum-half Graham Fryer and Hamilton kept moving the point of attacks.
With their pack in charge, it was no surprise that they opened the scoring on 13 minutes.
Textbook go-forward ball from a ruck wide on the right side was sprayed left with Hamilton feeding Paterson in open country.
Paterson’s darting diagonal caused confusion in the visiting defensive line and took him to within five metres of the line.
A pass-out-of-tackle found Mackay in support for the five-pointer.
The full-back’s well-struck conversion stalled in the cross-wind.
Highland almost struck back within a minute of the kick-off when a line-out offence gave them a penalty which Wylie pushed wide of the posts.
The gathering wind made for difficult handling conditions with the game lapsing into regular messy spells.
Highland were now firmly in the contest and they drew level midway through the half with a long-distance move launched from a scrum.
The key link was provided by Craig Findlater with the speedster deserting his right wing post to make major inroads before feeding Cieran Watson.
The left winger’s chip-and-gather saw him over for an unconverted try.
The game was delicately poised with a high error count and -- in the case of the Greens -- a misfiring line-out, making for stop-start passages of play.
The Greens almost forged ahead four minutes from the interval when a cracking line break from Evan Sutherland was supported by back row colleague Stevie Campbell.
The flanker romped over only for the would-be score to be ruled out for a marginal forward pass.
The second half started ominously for the Greens with the home support muted by a sustained, well-constructed series of plays by Highland.
The latter’s potential trump card lay in moving the ball wide to their back three who all impressed with the few chances they had to run from deep.
It was however some impressive close-up work by the Highland pack which provided the basis for the pressure they exerted in the run-up to taking the lead.
A series of breenges deep in the Caithness 22 were repelled within the shadow of the line while the Greens were conceding a mounting tally of penalties, mainly for going off their feet at rucks.
After turning down the chance of a pop at goal straight in front of the posts,
Caithness offended again on 52 minutes and this time Richard Sim took the opportunity to kick his side 8-5 ahead.
Highland were to rue not making more of that purple patch as they were to spend just about the rest of the game penned in their own half.
The Greens were unlucky not to draw ahead five minutes later when a raid down the narrow side ended with Pottinger giving Mill a run for the line at the swimming pool end.
The winger was scragged by two opponents though his belief that he had grounded the ball on the line was not shared by ref Steve Melon.
Mill made a useful impact in attack and defence in a game which made him the 15th most capped Green of all time.
Caithness sustained the momentum and on 57 minutes forged in front thanks to another coruscating midfield break from Paterson which this time took him all the way to the line near the left-hand flag.
The score came at the cost of Paterson damaging a knee which ended his involvement.
Highland’s threat was now confined to long-range forays with one ending with Findlater requiring a cover tackle from Hamilton on the halfway line to prevent the winger racing clear.
A late tackle by Highland number eight Kenny Cameron allowed Mackay to stretch the lead to 13-8 six minutes from time.
A second more difficult penalty by Mackay four minutes later stretched the lead outwith a converted try.
The icing on the cake for Caithness came a minute later when Campbell sped through an undefended channel near the centre of the park.
His pass gave Gordon a stroll to the posts to allow Mackay to add the extra points.
The final play saw Highland pressing the opposition line with skipper Gareth High held up inches short before the ball was shipped out wide for Findlater to cross.
Greens coach Jim MacMillan was particularly pleased with how his men wrested the initiative from Highland in the second half.
“I thought we played really well in the last 20 minutes,” he said.
“There were one or two sticky spells before that but overall I thought we stuck in pretty well.
“We coped with just about everything they threw at us though it has to be said that they are far from the strongest team in the league.”
The coach was happy with a second win at Millbank but knows that they will have to start picking up points on their travels.
Tonight, the Greens set off on their first trip to Fort Matilda – the home of Greenock Wanderers.
Relegated from NLD1 last year, Wanderers have had a mixed start to their campaign, losing narrowly to Linlithgow and then defeating Glasgow Accies before suffering a 62-3 hammering in Whitecraigs last Saturday.
Blair McIntosh remains sidelined with a thigh injury while Paterson is also unlikely to have recovered from the injury he picked up on Saturday.
With scrum-half Fryer back offshore, Hamilton and Mackay will resume their half-back partnership.
Campbell also misses out on tomorrow’s match through work commitments.
Caithness – G. Mackay, K. Gove, D. Gordon, J. Paterson, K. Foubister, K. Hamilton, G. Fryer, J. Foubister, S. Dunnett, D. Buchanan, E. Boyd (cpt), G. Anderson, D. Pottinger, E. Sutherland, S. Campbell. Replacements -- (all used) – D Budge, M. Flavell and K. Foubister.
Highland – R. Sim, C. Findlater, A. Kennedy, M. Whiteford, C. Watson, J. Wylie, T. MacGowan, N. Wilson, I. MacLean, S. Murray, S. Stephen, A. Begg. A. Beattie, K. Cameron, G. High (cpt).
Replacements (all used) – M. Thompson, J. Gilchrist and C. McLure.
Ref – Mr S. Melon, Rosyth.
* Whitecraigs are one of three unbeaten sides, having clocked up over 100 points in their opening three victories.
Linlithgow continued their strong start with a 43-7 eclipse of Forrester while newly promoted Hawick YM made it three wins out of three with a 14-7 victory over Stewartry.
In other games, Glasgow Accies defeated Hillfoots 43-12 while Kilmarnock returned with a hard-earned 10-0 win over Newton Stewart.
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| 1st XV Season (2009/10) |
| Kilmarnock 81 - 5 Caithness |
| 17th Apr 10 - KO: 12:00 |
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| :: Match Report |
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| 1st XV Season (2010/11) |
| Caithness vs Kilmarnock |
| 4th Sep 10 - KO: 15:00 |
| Venue: Millbank |
| :: More Fixtures |
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