Melrose make Currie pay a high price for indiscipline

Currie can justifiably attribute their two defeats in the opening two rounds of the RBS Premiership to the absence of a number of key players, but on Saturday it was indiscipline that cost the Malleny Park side dearly.

Twice in the match at the Greenyards a yellow card was shown to locks Andy Adam, for a late tackle, and Simon Marcell for a punch.

“It cost us four tries,” observed Currie coach Ally Donaldson. Admittedly, Melrose also lost a player to the sin-bin, winger Allan Dodds being given a ten-minute breather for an off-the-ball tackle.

Donaldson is expecting his experienced stand-off Andy Binikos to return on Saturday, allowing Jamie Forbes, who had a useful game at ten, to revert to full back to give Currie more fluency behind the scrum.

For Melrose, Andrew Skeen excelled but it was the second-half appearance of Edinburgh centre James King that added extra fizz to their back line. First-half tries by Alun Walker and Joe Helps contributed to a 17-9 interval lead, and then, with Marcell out for ten minutes, Fraser Thomson and Skeen ran in tries before replacement Bruce Colvine made it five, Currie’s only reply being a Mark Cairns effort.

Scorers: Melrose – Tries: Walker, Helps, Thomson, Skeen, Colvine. Cons: Skeen 4; Pens: Skeen 2. Currie – Try: Cairns. Con: Forbes. Pens: Forbes 3.

Melrose: F Thomson; A Dodds, J Murray, C Murray, J Helps; A Skeen, S McCormick; C Keen, A Walker, G Holburn, R Miller, G Elder, J Dalziel, G Runciman, G Dodds. Subs used:R Ferguson, K Cooney, P Eccles, B Colvine, J King.

Currie: B Mansfield; A Whittingham, D Fife, A MacMahon, R Neill; J Forbes, R Sneddon; J Cox, F Scott, A Hamilton, S Marcell, A Adam, M Cairns, M Entwhistle, R Weston. Subs used: N Scobie, F Gillies, A Best, M Peacock, C Leck.

Referee: A McPherson.