A large travelling support went down to Newtown St Boswells hoping to see a confident Forrester team challenging an unbeaten team vying for top spot in the league. It was good to see players, family and other club members coming down to support the team in this big match and the offer of filled rolls or 50p mixtures from behind the bar in the clubhouse was too much for most fans to turn down. There are jokes to be made about Norrie with his packet of sweets and cheeky smile but this is not the forum for those. Other fans were partaking in the alcoholic offerings in the bar and with rumors of a dry bus going back up the road they were keen to drink up while it was available. Your intrepid reporter busied himself with correcting the numerous spelling mistakes in the home team match day programme and wondering if the home team may be distracted by the offering of “EXSOTIC” dancing on offer at the player’s night after the game. I’ve never seen a “SOTIC” dancer so have no idea what somebody who used to be a “SOTIC” dancer moves like. The mind boggles. Meanwhile, out on the pitch Forrester went through their normal routine while NSB went through the longest and most elaborate warm up I’ve seen in a while. However, it wasn’t quite long enough for their number 17 to warm up enough to take off his tights.

The game started with Sean putting up a good kick and the forwards chased well. The NSB team knew they were in a game from the start as Forrester caused a lot of pressure and sadly their eagerness was too much for the referee. A penalty for offside in the midfield relieved some of this pressure and NSB knocked the penalty over to lead 3-0. The next few minutes saw an exchange of good kicks from hand finding some space although the kick chase wasn’t quite enough to make the most of them. A kick for touch from a penalty was missed by Newbs but his forwards recovered it with a lineout steal and another penalty for the visitors quickly followed. This gave Newbs the opportunity to correct his earlier mistake and he knocked it over. 3-3 and the games was on. A poor scrum in midfield from the kick off let NSB turn the ball over and then 2 grubber kicks later and they were under the posts for the first try which was converted. A bit of fortune involved in the try but the pressure was starting to tell on our defence and we were starting to let them run at us rather than meeting them. NSB’s defence was still fierce and they were rushing off their line to meet our attack which resulted in a turn over and their 13 kicked a long range penalty via the cross bar from just inside our half. Forrester looked as if they had lost their way a little after this with some poor kicking from hand allowing the NSB back 3 the opportunity to run the ball back at us and we started to look for the special off-load when trucking it up might have been the better option. The coaches quickly got the message on to stop trying the high risk plays and play ‘percentage’ rugby and the players picked up on it as the defence tightened and we put some good phases together. The next moment on the pitch was memorable for non-rugby reasons as the NSB number 3 had to run over to the side of the pitch, remove a whistle from his grandmother’s lips and politely request that she “stop being a f*&cking idiot”. Safe to say that is the first time most of the fans had ever heard that sentence and likely will never hear it again. Unbelievable Jeff.

Sadly the spell of good pressure from Forrester wasn’t fruitful in terms of points and the next points were scored by NSB with another penalty, just after the first of the referee’s long chats with the captains. Forrester were awarded the next penalty from kick off but Newbs missed touch again and 2 kicks and 70m later we were camped on our own line. However, an excellent steal from Newbs corrected his mistake and we cleared our lines. Another lineout steal from Himbo and another penalty got us in to the NSB half for the first time in over 10 minutes. However, this didn’t last long with NSB starting to put the Forrester scrum under some real pressure and from one of these scrums their number 8 managed to get away, handing Sean and Lucas off to score in the corner. The conversion was missed but NSB went in to half time leading 21-3.

The half time chat from the Forrester players and coaching staff was about staying together, getting on the front foot and playing the game in NSB’s 22, and being more aggressive in defence. Positive but honest chat from the squad and the sizable Forrester support was hopeful of a change in fortunes playing downhill with a chilling gentle breeze at our backs.

The 2nd half began with the Forrester scrum changing the tide a little and starting to get the upper hand in the scrum and they got plenty of practice with a number of knock on's from both teams in a period of scrappy play. Frustrations began to boil over and there were a few altercations. Rumours of punches thrown and eyes gouged swept along the sidelines and some spectators decided they wanted to be part of the arguments too. Some club members, including yours truly, succeeding in keeping the peace but my notes for the next few minutes of the game are very sparse. Most of the game at this stage was being played in the NSB half but Forrester were finding it hard to break through a solid and aggressive defensive line. With a good turnover and a couple of penalties later NSB turned the pressure round and got them up the pitch resulting in a try in the corner which was converted well. This seemed to break the Forrester resolve and fatigue started to show with lots of spaces for NSB to exploit. They did this well and were able to make the most of their opportunities by turning an initially scrappy grubber kick in to a try under the posts and the bonus was deservedly secured. With the travelling support thinking about the warm clubhouse and the bus trip back to Edinburgh, the referee blew the final whistle and ended the game at NSB 35 Forrester 3.

An enjoyable bus trip back up the road with some interesting singing and that continued in the wee bar in to the wee hours of Sunday morning. Although that didn’t completely mask what was a pretty disappointing result for everyone involved from Forrester but we were beaten by a better team on the day. Focus now moves to getting the season back on track next week with the 1s at home against Leith and the 2s at home against Stewarts Melville. 2 wins would be a great start to February and would get the wheels back on the promotion wagon for both teams.