Stirling County 52 - 5 Ayr: Stirling sign off the Pollock era by crushing Ayr

Stirling’s departing director of rugby was justifiably thrilled to leave the club on a high note after his players demolished Ayr in a second-half onslaught.

Eddie Pollock, who has taken up an SRU post as national under-18s coach, said: “We were very good today. We were attritional.

“All the pressure we put Ayr under eventually wore them out. Ayr’s defence was excellent for an hour but then it lost its effectiveness.

“It was absolutely the perfect send-off. I’m very proud of these guys and how they’ve performed over the past couple of months. I couldn’t have had a better group of players to work with.

“The British and Irish Cup is now a realistic goal for this team. The guys will regroup and come back in January and have to take this forward.”

He was right to praise his team for a fine performance of power play and open running rugby. County led all the way, going in front thanks to an early try by Michael Doneghan and a penalty from Brian Archibald.

However, Ayr closed the gap shortly before the break when a clever move by the backs allowed Steven Manning in for a touchdown.

After the interval, though, it was all Stirling. Archibald stretched the lead when he nudged over a penalty, before Ross Aitken pounced on indecision in the Ayr defence to grab a loose ball and dive over, the conversion being added by Archibald.

Danny Gilmour then grabbed a brace of tries, Archibald contributing the extra points to both, as County put Ayr to the sword.

Scorers: Stirling County: Tries: Doneghan, Aitken, Gilmour (2); Cons: Archibald (3); Pens: Archibald (2). Ayr: Try: Manning.

Stirling County: B Addison, M Doneghan, D Gilmour, B Archibald, R Aitken, S Edwards, S Kennedy, M McDonald, A Moffat, G Mountford, R McAlpine, C Deacons, Robbie Boswell, S Swindall, T Clarke. Reps: C Hutton, J Mountford, J Graham, S Robertson, C Robertson.

Ayr: L Basson, S Manning, G Anderson, M Stewart, C Taylor, R Ferguson, AJ MacFarlane, G Sykes, H Wisnewski, A Kelly, B McPherson, C White, J Willis, A Dunlop, P McCallum. Reps: C Brown, C Davidson, S Fenwick, M McConnel, M Beckwith.

Referee: A McMenemy.