Grant Gilchrist calls on Edinburgh fans to help keep their 1872 Cup hopes alive

Grant Gilchrist after the first 1872 Cup match between Glasgow Warriors and Edinburgh Rugby at Scotstoun. Picture: Ross Parker/SNS

Following last weekend’s close 20-16 loss to Glasgow at Scotstoun, Richard Cockerill’s side need a result at BT  Murrayfield tomorrow afternoon to keep the three-match series alive.

Around 21,000 tickets were reported to have already been sold at the start of the week and the 29-year-old second-row forward said: “We hope to get a big crowd. We can get more people at Murrayfield than there are at Scotstoun.

“We’ll get a lot of bodies, we just hope that the Edinburgh public saw enough in us last Saturday to come and support us this weekend. I’m sure they will and they’ll create a great atmosphere for us to play in.

“We love playing at Murrayfield – that’s clear by our form – we’ll take on anyone there.”

Gilchrist, pictured, admitted that he has some frustration to unleash after a fragmented game at Scotstoun, which included a number of reset scrums and, of course, five  yellow cards.

“If you watch our games in the lead-up to this, we don’t have many scrums go to the ground,” said the 40-times capped lock.

“We went there, we wanted to scrum and we feel frustrated that it was going to ground. It takes two to tango, I know that as much as the next person, but we need to get it sorted out for this week. We want a battle, the crowd want a battle – they don’t want to see scrums going to the deck every time.

“We went there and we wanted a contest – we feel like we didn’t manage to get that. We’ll look at ourselves first, we’re not going to go complaining and crying to anyone. We’ll look at what we can do to stop that. I think that will be  important for this week.”

Asked what specifically needs to change for Edinburgh to get on the right end of the result tomorrow,  Gilchrist replied: “We need to be more accurate on the whole.

“It [Scotstoun] is a tough place to go, but at key times we made errors, whether that’s dropping the ball or not being strong in contact.

“For us it feels like one that got away – we were right in that game and we’re bitterly  disappointed we didn’t come away with the win because we back ourselves to be better than that.”

Edinburgh’s recent record of winning the 1872 Cup four times in the last five seasons has been a source of pride to the club, but vital Guinness Pro14 points are at stake too, of course.

“It’s huge. In the context of the 1872 Cup, in the context of the league,” said Gilchrist.

“If we win, we’re still right in the hunt. We’ll be working hard this week and making sure we’re in the best possible shape to go and do that.”