West of Scotland 39 - 26 Watsonians: Classy display by youthful West delights Robertson

THE post-match demeanour of the rival coaches perfectly summed-up this nine-try Burnbrae spectacular.

While Watsonians' Marcus Di Rollo confined himself to a terse "Poor, we shot ourselves in the foot with missed tackles, there is nothing else I can say" his opposite number Keith Robertson waxed lyrical.

"Delighted, our continuity was excellent," he purred. "We did what we sought to do, get our big guys running at them and this has been a terrific confidence-booster. We have a young squad and sometimes my biggest problem is curbing their enthusiasm, but we made a great start and just grew from there.

"We've got a hard run of games coming-up, Stirling County away, they Currie, Ayr and Melrose, but certainly, this result was a major boost to us".

Alasdair Stevenson kicked an early penalty for West of Scotland then converted Calum Morrison's try, before Andrew Skeen opened Watsonians' account with an unconverted try.

Three tries in ten minutes in mid-half put West on the way to their victory. Solo runs by the impressive Mark Jenkinson and Michael Sim produced tries, both converted by Stevenson, before prop Elliot McLaren burrowed over from a close-range line-out for the bonus-point try.

Grant Somerville's last gasp try for Watsonians on half time, converted by Mike Kerr, offered the visitors hope, quickly dashed after the break by a Stevenson penalty and the stand off's conversion of a break-out try by flanker Adam de Sainte-Croix and at 39-12 it seemed like game over.

Watsonians made the most of West skipper David Young's ten minutes in the sin bin, bagging a bonus point through tries by Nick Hart, converted by Kerr and one scored and converted by Jamie Forbes, before running out of steam and themselves finishing with 14 men after number eight Harris Grant was shown the yellow card in the final minute.

The result leaves Watsonians at the foot of the table with only two points - and West just two places above them but with eight more points.

Scorers: West of Scotland: Tries: Morrison, Jenkinson, Sim, McLaren, Sainte-Croix. Cons: Stevenson (4). Pens: Stevenson (2). Watsonians: Tries: Skeen, Somerville, Hart, Forbes. Cons: Ker (2), Forbes.

West of Scotland: Sim, McCall-Hagan (Davis), Dalgleish, Horner, Matheson, Stevenson, McConnell (Fisken); McLaren, McKenna (Haswell), Henderson (Marshall), Jenkinson, McAlpine, Young, De Sainte-Croix (Walker), Morrison.

Watsonians: Forbes (Nash), Sorbie (Mokomoko), Brown, Blackwood, Somerville, Skeen, Ker, Laird (Owenson), Hart, OrrKoertze, Ursache, Gorman, Paulo (Fedo), Finnie, Grant.

Referee: G Knox (Greenock).