It was lovely to play on the pitches in front of the Junior School at Strathallan in what were blustery conditions. The home team had just the 5 players and in the first half, Torin, Stuart and Blake volunteered to play for them. Arran also joined them when one of their players went off injured.

We began the first half with some terrific forward play. James led from the front with some terrific steals at the breakdown and Timothy looked to spread the ball into the wide channels where Salman and Jack were waiting on the wings. We quickly went two tries up but Strath, thanks to the great work Torin and co were doing, came back and Blake managed to dodge a few tackles to score. However, thanks to some aggressive running from Bertie and Monty we widened the gap on the scoreboard and it was lovely to see Jack who has been out for so long, get his first try. Salman was instrumental in the move with some terrific hands in the centre and the offload from Harry was superb, allowing Jack a free run in to make it 5-1 just before the break.

In the second half, Bertie, Monty, James and Timothy went over to the Strath side and the game was much more competitive. They all put in a shift to bring the home team back into the game with James getting an early try before Monty brought the scores back to within two. However, our tackling was superb, particularly from Blake, Harry and Arran and the work Torin did at the break down, ensured some clean ball for our quick backs to run in another few tries. Nick’s individual effort was something to behold and despite Bertie putting in an almighty hit on his schoolmate right on the try line, Cargilfield were able to recycle the ball and Arran sealed the win. Timothy went over for Strath in the penultimate play but it wasn’t quite enough; however, a 3-3 draw in the second half was testament to how hard the 4 boys playing for Strath worked.

Well done to all the boys who played hard no matter which team they represented but player of the match was Jack who participated really well and enjoyed getting back out there and playing some rugby for the first time in 2 months.